The Mythical Yoshi of Legend
by thecrazyfanficcer
Summary: It was he who made up the myth, the legend, the saga. It was he who save them all when the Yoshis were in danger. It was he who would come, a light in the dark, to save their lives...
1. The Life Behind the Muse

**A/N: Here I am with a Mario story for this site – the first, but not the last. As for the dissy… Super Mario and all related indicia are property of Nintendo and Shigeru Miyamoto and not me. Now, on with the fanfic! **

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The Pokémon were restless.

Their leader of craziness and all things mischievous, Pikachu, was especially affected. His grandfather, Jonah Bolt by name and right but Old Geeze to the thunder mouse and his friends, had a habit of coming to the Pokémon's small condo in southwest Santa Fe every two weeks or so. The last time he'd come to the door he had recounted an amazing adventure of a thunder Yoshi; a deep tale of adventure and true love. At this very moment, Pikachu's spine tingled at the thought. He could hardly wait – provided Old Geeze came, of course.

Suddenly, the door swung open on its hinges, seemingly on its own. A figure appeared in the doorway, his lithe figure darkened by the glow of the shining stars behind him. Behind Pikachu, Umbreon shifted so that his black ringed ears wavered. He inclined his head and angled a beam of purest moonlight to Old Geeze, who cocked his head and scratched one pointed yellow ear.

"Thanks, Umby," Old Geeze declared, leaning heavily on the cane that was always close to paw. His grizzled gray bangs fell over his bright black eyes, partly masking them from view so that they shined like beacons from in between the hair. "I could use that." He made his way over to the battered old stool that stood on three legs at the front of the room.

Silently, wordlessly, the Pokémon watched with bated breath as the old storyteller ascended his throne.

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Lila, the Yoshi's Island chieftainess, stood up and thrust her chalice into the air. She was rather young for clan leader on Junglestream Island; at twenty-two (in their years), it was said that she was younger than the first chieftain himself. But all this lay deep and unforgotten in Lila's memory as her silver gem-encrusted chalice touched the air; tonight was a time for celebration.

"By my cup and by my blood," Lila began excitedly, her red scales aflame as the arm holding the cup stretched, victorious and unwavering, above the raised heads of every Yoshi in the densely-packed room, "Let us honour these brave travellers from the Mushroom Kingdom and welcome them into our home." She slashed the chalice in a downward motion onto the white-clothed table, indicating the end of her speech and the beginning of the festivities. The Yoshis cheered, their hundred voices melting and fleshing together in a cacophony of welcome and happiness, along with five others clumped up in their midst. They didn't have to say anything, but Mario, plumber extraordinaire, got up with a bow and a flourish of his own silver chalice, tossing it from hand to gloved hand as he began his own speech.

"A-well, first of all I'd-a like to thank Daisy for-a convincing the good old Piantas at the_ Mushroom Express_ to fly us over here today," Mario began, the chalice flicking back and forth, back and forth, between his hands. Daisy, the princess of Sarasaland, got up and took a bow before quickly going down among the Yoshis. "Also, I'd-a like to thank Lila for-a doing what she did and accepting us here. And finally, I'd-a like to thank all the rest of you, for believing in me and helping me and-a Luigi when Peach was-a kidnapped. Thank you!" Done, he took another bow and sat back down, grinning happily from under his mustache.

That was too much for Yoshi, Mario's rideable dinosaur. He burst out laughing, his red scales bobbing as he leaned back in his chair and his dinosaur laughter filled the air. "That's a good one, Mario," he said through the snarks. "I can still remember the day when I had to save _you_!"

Mario paused a minute, considering his options, then laughed and slapped Yoshi across the back. "Yeah, but then again it's-a not _my _fault I-a got kidnapped." He stopped, thinking, mustache aquiver. "Besides, I was-a only a baby back-a then."

Luigi, Mario's green-clad brother, stretched from where he was sitting beside the eccentric duo, long arms extended until his silver chalice glinted in the light. "Either way, it-a comes out to the same-a thing, doesn't it?" the younger brother commented with a content yawn. "All-a five of us, we're the band of heroes."

Mario looked at Luigi oddly, his head cocked and his red cap slightly askew. "Gee, I-a never knew that, little bro," he said, sincerely (or so it seemed).

Luigi grinned at his brother's sarcasm, then turned away from the pair of them and turned to where his friend (and crush) Daisy was excitedly talking to a yellow blue-scaled Yoshi named Mera.

"You need a Yoshi, Daisy," Mera was telling her, the pointed blue scales behind her head rippling as she spoke. "I mean, Mario has one, so why don't you get one, too?"

Daisy shrugged, nonchalantly it seemed, but her bright blue eyes were glowing. "That would be a great idea, Mera, but where would I get one?" She went rigid for a second, as if considering her options, then went on, excitedly. "On second thought, where _could_ I get a Yoshi?"

Mera grinned in all happiness, as if glad that Daisy had finally succumbed to her inexorable Yoshi power. "Well, there's a lot on the island that want to see the world," she continued, her own caramel-brown eyes twinkling mischievously. "You could bring one of them."

Luigi giggled slightly at the thought of Daisy, princess of the Chai Kingdom in Sarasaland, bringing home a Yoshi for her kingdom to enjoy. Or rather - to ride around everywhere, showing off her new dinosaur as she explored the nooks and crannies of her ancestral home. That was pure Daisy for you, as Luigi very well knew.

Meanwhile, the plumber-dinosaur wisecracks had now subsided and Lila, Yoshi chieftainess, was talking to Yoshi instead. The two were rapidly involved in conversation, and Luigi let his eyes glaze over as he listened to their chatter.

"What's it like out there, Yoshi?" Lila wondered, waving her arm in the air.

"In the Mushroom Kingdom?" Yoshi asked, reaching for his silber chalice and draining it. "Well…" The red-scaled Yoshi tossed his head back as he thought about it. "It's big. That's the first thing I can say about it. Gigantic, even." (Shigeru Miyamoto has got this VIVID imagination - I feel justified in writing that. XD)

Lila nodded with rapt attention, her eyes focused on the wall behind Yoshi. "What kind of places are there in the Mushroom Kingdom, Yoshi?"

"All kinds," Yoshi grinned back with a wave of his own hand. "There's Toad Town, Dry Dry Desert, Delfino Island, Boo's Mansion, Oho Oasis, and even a volcano! It's really awesome," he exclaimed, his green skin seeming to glow as he described the kingdom. "That's not all, though."

"What else is there, then?" Lila asked, reaching for a slice of strawberry-watermelon cake that had just been served (_Oh, so _that's_ what Yoshi's eat,_ Mario thought as he watched the pair of them. _And I thought they just ate berries and fruit and stuff_).

"Well, there's the Beanbean Kingdom," Yoshi mused thoughtfully, his big black pupils scanning the ceiling. "And Sarasaland, of course."

Lila's azure eyes were glowing so brightly that Yoshi unconsciously leaned back just looking at them. When he was younger, before he'd had all his adventures with Mario and the others, he'd oft seen her like that on his adventures on Junglestream (which was conveniently located a few miles south of Yoshi's Island). It usually meant something crazily insane was about to follow.

"Yoshi," Lila added, her eyes glowing, "This might seem selfish of me, but… Can you take me with you next time you go back to the Mushroom Kingdom?"

Yoshi had to bit his lip to keep from laughing. "All right," he said, barely holding himself. "You can come, but you'll have to stay at the palace."

Her bright blue eyes lighting up, Lila bowed her head and rippled her scales in the traditional Yoshi fashion. Yoshi inclined his own head and smiled. The two shook hands, signalling agreement.

Lila could usually contain herself pretty well, but Yoshi could see the light in her eyes as they broke hands she swivelled around to face her friend, the young red Alber. As soon as her back was turned, Yoshi broke out laughing.

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**A/N: Well, there you have it – the first installment of this new fic. 'Til next chappie!**


	2. The Craziness of Junglestream

**Here we are with the second installment of MYL... And no, there's no Pokémon. ;)  
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"I a-don't want to a-get up!"

That was the first thing sound that greeted Peach's ears when she stepped into Mario's bedroom the following morning. Rolling her eyes, the princess of the Mushroom Kingdom strode over to the leafy paradise that served as a bed and attempted to pull the plumber out by his bare arm. (She also happened Mario had donned his summer suit for the vacation. Hopefully no one would accuse him of graffiti this time, eh?)

"Mario!" Peach called right into his ear, tilting her head so that one of her highlighter-yellow locks fell from below her diamond-studded crown and draped itself right across his nose. "Are you getting up or not?"

"Mm! That's a-some mighty fine pasta!" In a flash Mario bolted out of bed, sniffing the air hungrily. "Oh," he declared as reality clicked in, "it's a-just you. I should have figured a-you'd put on the lasagna-flavoured hair spray."

"It was just to get you up, of course," Peach said with a laugh, trying-to no avail, of course-to wrench him out of bed. "Now get up, sleepy Garfield, and join me in a journey of this Monday morning madness."

Mario laughed and pushed Peach's arm away, just about persuading to her to leave him be while he got dressed. The princess left after that, promising that if he didn't come in five minutes all the good Yoshi maple pancakes would be gone.

As soon as she'd left, Mario dressed as fast as he could, almost forgetting his traditional red M cap in his haste.

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Yoshi breezed in the Yoshi eating hall that morning for breakfast, accompanied by Luigi. Mario's younger brother had his arm on the dinosaur's bare back, which, he thought, was strange with the usual red saddle.

"Well, you know, I only wear it when I'm with you and the others," Yoshi grinned, wiggling and rippling his red scales in delight. It was a beautiful day, he was back in his favourite vacation spot, and his friends were there with him. _Today I'm going to show the others the wonders of the modern Yoshi world,_ he thought with a small, not-so-hidden grin.

"You guys a-make pancakes, right?" Luigi asked Mera as the two of them walked around the leafy oval table that they had been seated around the night before. "At least, that's-a what I heard Peach shouting at Mario when he a-got up this morning."

Mera tossed her head back and laughed, not bothering to hold herself back. "That's a good one," she said with a good-natured smile when it was over. Her long red tongue flashing vibrantly as she talked, she went on: "Maple flavoured, but then again, that's because we don't have maple syrup. We have Yoshi syrup."

"Yoshi syrup?" Luigi queried.

"Best syrup in the whole kingdom," Yoshi cut in, roguishly lifting up a bottle of honey-coloured liquid. "Made from fresh Yoshi leaves crushed the day they're picked, they say it's even better than Chucklehuck Cola."

Luigi took a platter of the pancakes from the middle of the table (the Yoshi's had a buffet every morning, it seemed), licking his mustached lip in anticipation. Gratefully he accepted a bottle of the syrup from Yoshi, who grinned and leaned back in his chair. Carefully he squeezed the middle of the bottle, watching in amazement as thick, tasty, sweet-looking syrup poured out. The enticing smell was enough to make Luigi's eyes burn as he reached to put the bottle away-but then decided against it and happily filled his plate once more.

When he was done, Yoshi wagged his short tail and asked, "How was it?"

Luigi seemed to relish the taste of the native syrup in his mouth for a second, his eyes closed. Suddenly, his eyes popped open and he grabbed Yoshi by the scales, pulling the rideable dinosaur close to his face so that big nose rubbed against green snout.

"It was A-DELICIOUS!" Luigi yelled into the dinosaur's ear (or where his ear should have been, anyway) and, as expected, ran off to tell Mario. A few seconds later, the elder plumber had been told and Yoshi cocked his head, expectantly waiting for the clomping of shoes to be heard.

In the meanwhile, though, Yoshi sensed movement. A purple figure came and sat down beside him, her cheeks glowing red among the violet. Yoshi recognized her. She was Violet, another Yoshi he had known since childhood.

Yoshi's cheeks flushed. "Uh-hi, Violet," he stuttered, feeling the blush creep across his face.

She was blushing almost as much as he was. "What are your friends doing?"

"Wha-Oh. Mario and Luigi," Yoshi informed her, his groove returning, "have recently tasted the wonders of Yoshi syrup, which can cause even the calmest person out there to act like a demented Gourmet Guy."

Violet giggled at that, and her blush disappeared in unison with Yoshi's own. "Ha, that's a good one. I always wondered what would happen if humans tasted it."

Yoshi cocked his head to the side and grinned.

Miraculously enough, after his five-minute outburst, Luigi calmed down somewhat, though by this time Mario - crazy guy that he was - had already tasted the Yoshi syrup and was experiencing a hangover some hours later, when Yoshi descended down to the foliage of the island's wide-spread forest.

A satchel filled with lunch swung over his shoulder, Yoshi hummed to himself as he climbed down the woodland cliff that led to the forest, like he had so many times as a child. It wasn't a cliff really; it was more like a ridge that led from the island's highlands down to the forest, which was set lower below the cliff. The forest itself was a peaceful place; thick green leaves formed a sunlight-dappled forest canopy and helped all things growing. Sometimes, if Yoshi listened carefully enough, he thought he could hear the serenade of the forest (Not minuet, Ocarina of Time fans. Serenade sounds better.)

Childhood memories assailed Yoshi as he hopped from the rocky ridge and ran into the forest. Playing make-believe with his friends in the forest, listening to shells at the beach, swimming, all sorts of stuff… Yoshi grinned and delight as he ran on, nearly colliding with a familiar figure who had been standing there, snout raised toward the sky.

"I'm so sorry!" Yoshi squealed as he helped the other person up.

"'Sall right," answered the other being, cocking his head to the side.

Suddenly, a memory wended its way into Yoshi's brain canal, a small, darting streak of remembrance, like a vein of pain. Judging by the expression on the other Yoshi's face, something like that was happening to him too.

Before they knew it, they were giving each other a big bear hug.

"Yoshi!"

"Midnight!"

"So, how have things been going?" Midnight asked his old friend as the two of them walked through the forest a seconds later, chatting amiably.

"Not bad, not bad. But sometimes I get tired of all this hero work, you know?" Yoshi filled his friend in happily, stopping at one point to pull some leaves off a tree. He handed some to Midnight and the two of them walked on, talking as they munched their leaves.

"What about you?" Yoshi wondered, nibbling off the top of his own leaf. "What's been happening on the island since I left?"

"Oh, you know, normal life," Midnight replied with a nonchalant shrug. "A few new eggs hatched yesterday."

"Really? Whose?"

So they continued wandering through the forest, getting reacquainted with each other since the last time Yoshi had visited Junglestream Island (_I knew something was up when he rescued Mario from Yoshi's Island so many years ago, _Midnight reminisced reverently. As he soon learned, his green-scaled friend had become the steed for the noblest plumber in the Mushroom Kingdom.). "So much stuff has happened, it's weird to think you've been gone all these years," the blue one stated, wolfing down the last of his leaves and reaching for a fiery red berry perched in the heights above.

"Careful with that. You'll burn your tongue," Yoshi remarked with some amusement.

"Yeah, but then again I can shoot Spinies with it," Midnight joked, laughing and zinging one of the newly-appeared spiked turtles with his now-zesty tongue.

And so, laughing, they progressed through the forest.


	3. Avian Drop Ins

**Yay! Someone actually reviewed!**

**RIVolleyball214: Thanks so much for reviewing my fic! I read the first chapter of your story - Luigi working with Flavio and Mario married with Peach? Sounds interesting...**

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Mario was rushing through another area of the Junglestream forest, brown shoes clicking against the green leaves beneath his toes as he ran on and on. The others rushed after him, a multicoloured mass of yellow, green, gold, pink, and silver. They were running because... Well… It had been Luigi's idea. Shortly before he'd recovered from the bout of crazy insanirt induced by the Yoshi syrup, that is. Actually, it was a race, and the crafty red-clad plumber knew he was winning.

"Ha ha! Gotcha!" Daisy cried suddenly, her yellow summer skirt flashing as she caught up from behind him and took the lead. Mario powered up his legs and charged after her, but the princess of Sarasaland was in no way about to give up. Until, of course, Luigi and Peach joined their power and raced way ahead of him.

Mario groaned aloud as he skidded to a halt, but it didn't matter to him. The real Mario only got mad when he didn't succeed in saving Peach from Bowser. Or so he would have, except that, up to date, he had always managed to get her back from the evil Koopa King. Anyway-as it was-aside from joking around, he had another reason to skid to a halt. A giant forest opened up below the ridged plateau they were standing on, its leafy heights spanning a length of approximately a hundred and two acres. Mario stopped just in time to prevent himself from toppling from the cliff and into the foliage. Which, judging by the canopy of greenness, wouldn't actually have hurt that much.

"Careful-If you fall you'll-a get hurt." Luigi, unlike his older brother, slid to a smooth stop right behind Mario. "I never a-knew there was a forest on-a Junglestream-did you?"

"Oh," muttered Mario, his moustache quivering; he was thinking about what it would be like to fall from the plateau. "I never a-knew, no. You a-think it would hurt if I-a fell?"

"Well, yeah," a voice came from behind them, and both brothers whipped around to see Daisy rustling from the trees. Her yellow skirt was dotted with leaves and her hair had come loose from its normal curly ensemble. Her silver summer tiara had snagged on a bramble; it was showing, knotted thorns reaching up from a hole in her pocket, where she had stored it. "You thought that if you fell there'd be miles and miles of leaves to aid you in your quest downward?"

"Er-" began Mario, but Luigi intervened, laughing and slapping him across the shoulder.

"It's-a OK, we already-a know," he laughed with a gigantic grin. Mario recovered his spirits quickly and laughed along with his brother, until another rustling of bushes told them the last of their mismatched party had arrived.

"What's the deal with the clothes, Peach?" Daisy asked as a very rumpled, very annoyed princess of the Mushroom Kingdom crawled out from the bushes, muttering about annoying Cheep Cheeps. "You were all right about getting dirty in Mario Party and Mario Tennis."

"Well, I guess I don't like mud and Junglestream Island palm trees, Dai," Peach grumbled, wiping grime of the front of her fuchsia mini-skirt. She adjusted her own crown, perched atop her sea of golden locks, and straightened the front of her blouse. "But maybe I should enjoy it more," she added wistfully as her eyes coasted the horizon.

"Well, you're-a going to have-a to," Luigi contradicted; everyone turned to stare at him. "This-a definitely isn't a-going to be our-a last adventure." With that, he hopped down from the cliff with the greatest of ease-and, surprisingly, without a painful landing. _No wonder Luigi's a better jumper than me, _Mario thought to himself with a small grin.

Peach swung down to the forest with a vine, shimmying with all her princess-y grace. Before grabbing one of the whippy green tendrils herself, Daisy turned to Mario. "Hey, I just thought of something. Why are the games always named after you?"

"I don't know. Ask Shigeru Miyamoto and the translators that that, not me," Mario replied as he jumped to the island depths (and succeeded in breaking his ankle for the third time in two months).

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"Waaaaaahhh!"

With that annoyingly-clichéd cry, a shelled, amber figure flung through the forest foliage and landed with a thump in a clump of leaves ahead of Mario. The red-clad plumber bent down and turned the creature over, revealing the none-too-mysterious face of his friend Parakarry, the Paratroopa.

"Thanks, Mario. I needed that." Parakarry adjusted the thick brown goggles he always wore before clambering to his feet, his feathery white wings flapping slightly in the wind. He was the local avian postman of Dry Dry Outpost and could usually be seen flapping around the small mice-filled merchant town. Except, of course, where he-and a bunch of other allies-had joined Mario in what was known as his Paper Mario adventure. Parakarry was faithful, too; as he came jogging over after his elder brother, Luigi wondered why the Paratroopa had landed in the Yoshi Island Forest.

"You all-a right, Par?" Luigi asked he adjusted his thick-lensed goggles, straightened his brown helmet and alighted on a low-jutting branch of a nearby maple.

"I'm fine," Parakarry assured Luigi; he perched himself easily in the crook made by two branches of an oak tree to prove his point. "I heard you guys were visitng here, so I decided to drop by with my great-uncle Porgal." He glanced up at the forest canopy casually, cocking his head to the side and leading the others' gazes up with him.

Peach had arrived, side by side with Daisy. Now the princess of the Mushroom Kingdom extended one delicate white-gloved hand upward, pointing to a copper-coloured figure breaking through the thick green leaves. "Is that him?"

Parakarry was up in a flash, squealing. "Is he all right?" he cried as Porgal crashed through the thick, foresty underbrush.

The wise old Porgal rose gracefully up on his booted feet, cocking his head to the side with a dazzling smile and roguish wink. "That I am, great-nephew dearest."

Parakarry's scaled skin reddened; nevertheless, he managed to keep his cool and hopped into a pile of leaves behind him, letting the wind stir his feathery wings before sitting down with Porgal. The two Paratroopas made small talk with the Shroomian guests to Yoshi Island; Porgal, as it turned out, came from a region far from the Dry Dry Desert.

"Where?" Mario asked. "If-a you came from a-somewhere else, that-a doesn't explain why-a Parakarry isa the mail-Troopa for Dry Dry Oupost."

Parakarry gave a mischievous wink, slapping his great-uncle across his veined orangey-brown shoulder blades. The two airborne Troopas slapped wings together. "Rogueport."

At this point, the others all stared around at each other, whispering excitedly. Rogueport was a mysterious city visited by only one of them in living memory - Mario been there once with his friend Goombella. It was rumoured to be very mysterious, but Mario had shrugged it off then as if it had been nothing.

Now, his blue eyes lit up and he excitedly tugged on the tip of one of Porgal's wings. "It's been a while since I've last seen the place," he said, his eyes shining with a mysterious, annoying little thing known as adventure. "Come back to the tribe home with us," the plumber continued, steering the aged Paratroopa onto his feet and to the direction of the leafy mud-lined home of Yoshi's. "Lila will get you two rested and fed and then you can tell us about it."

And so it was an excited party that led the mail-Troopa and his great-uncle to the tribe home, and into another adventure.


	4. Island Celebrations

**A/N: There's a character in a Redwall book called Mhera... On the other hand, she was supposed to be called Meredith originally... Well, whatever. On with the fanfic!**

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"And we have two more friends who have visited us on this very eve of shining midsummer," Lila declared, her silver chalice thrust up high into the air. She really was a poetic and quick-thinking, good-natured Yoshi - which was exactly why she had been made island chieftainess.

"Let us-a talk and-a enjoy their entertainment…uh… Let us entertain a-them!" Mario cried, his own chalice up as he stumbled over the sentence… And his chair. Yoshi giggled at the plumber's clumsiness (_How'd he ever land himself in all those video games?_ the green dino wondered) and offered a hand to help him up. Mario groaned and rolled his eyes in return, though not without playfully donking his leaf-coloured steed on the head.

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Meanwhile, the other Yoshis' chatter filled the room as the milling coloured dinosaurs talked among themselves.

"I love it when we have visitors here," Gabe, a young light blue Yoshi, said happily to everyone in particular.

"Yeah. It brings out the best in everyone," agreed a rusty-orange Yoshi named Canberra (And yes, I happen to know that's the capital of Australia).

"And it brings us closer together," Violet's father, a young periwinkle specimen named Cloudfluff, called out.

"We all rock! Ain't that right, Vi?" Mera said, her blue scales rippling as she turned to her purple-scaled friend.

Violet grinned happily and munched on a small green leaf, imported all the way over from Koopa Village. She was staring right at Yoshi, though she was a multitasker and answered anyway. "Yeah, we all rock," she smiled contentedly, snuggling down into the leaf-covered seat. "All twenty-plus of us."

That caused a roar of laughter from the Yoshi's and Porgal alike; Parakarry and the other travelllers were talking amongst themselves and hadn't been listening to the Yoshis' chatter. Violet knew perfectly well that there were definitely more than twenty beings grouped around the table that night.

Joro, a tall, vibrant green Yoshi, was talking so fast his face was flushed. "I wonder what would happen if we took Yoshis from other parts of the world and let them breed with some of us here?" His words were a rapid rush of sound before he took approximately point seven seconds to sip a kiwi-mango slushie lying on his plate. "I wonder what their babies would look like?"

"Or even let Paratroopas breed with us," Elsa, a pink Yoshi, sister of three, added, bubbling with mirth.

"Yes. Very funny." Parakarry replied, looking peeved - but he was faking, of course. "Try a Shy Guy and a Koopa. Now _that_ can get ugly."

"Ugh," a red Yoshi named Nicky gagged into his hand. "I would hate to see that happen."

"Me, too," Midnight agreed, his red scales bobbing up and down as he nodded. "Yosh?"

"My name is Yoshi, not Yosh," the green one chastised lightly, in spite of the gigantic grin that was curling his features. "Nobody calls me that."

"Except your mom," teased a red blue-scaled Yoshi named Alber. He was young, about ten years old in the Yoshis' timeline. "Apparently, she calls you Yoshums!"

"Yoshums… I wonder where that came from," Porgal mused thoughtfully, joining in the conversation with a wink to his great-nephew. "The great Paratroopa mailman, perhaps?"

Daisy leaned back in her chair and heaved a sigh as she watched the crazy group of Yoshis and humans. These reconnaissance bashes always made everyone go crazy, though it wasn't unknown that Mario himself was on a normal basis. Still, Luigi conking Elsa on the head - playfully or not - was always a funny sight.

"Elsa, pink Yoshi." Even as she watched, Luigi teased the pink Yoshi by thwonking one of her bright red heart-shaped scales. "Only pink one on the whole island, or so it would seem." He accented his speech with an evil little laugh.

"Luigi Mario, he who likes Daisy of brown hair fair," Elsa sang back happily. Despite the fact that she was too old for this and no one was chasing her, she scurried under the greenery-draped table like a frightened hatchling.

Elsa seemed not to notice both Daisy's and Luigi's cheeks reddened in perfect unison. Their eyes met; the princess of the Chai Kingdom was the first to look away.

True love, or not?

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Doubtless, though, that Alber was happy when the crowd of them made their way back to the vine-ridden earthen dens of the tribe home. The young red Yoshi chattered happily to his two friends, who had split from the group and were deciding on yet another tour of the island's greenery some time later.

"There are more rumours about the Mystical Yoshi of Legend," Alber whispered, his voice hushed, as he cut a path through the winding jungle and wove his way down past the eventide shoreline. "We catch glimpses of him, in and out through the jungle, every few nights."

Both Yoshi and Midnight gasped soundlessly in revered awe. The Mythical Yoshi of Legend was the most elusive being of the whole island; it was said that he wasn't even a living, breathing thing. Though neither had met the evasive creature in person, the same question was circulating in both their minds.

"Where?" Yoshi and Midnight asked in perfect unison as the green one's long tongue snapped out at total random in his excitement. "Where is he?"

Alber's blue-booted feet came suddenly to a halt as the younger Yoshi reached for an intricately patterned leaf growing from a drooping Wonderful Willow. He snapped it off the stem and placed it in his mouth before picking out a few more to give the other two. They bobbed their heads, waiting while Alber enjoyed the taste of the turquoise-blue leaf on his tongue for a moment before ever so slowly turning around to face them.

"They don't know."

"What?" Midnight's mouth dropped open and his leaf fluttered to the ground, aided by a slight breeze in the night. "What are you saying?" The sight of his widened white eyes, rigid, stiff red scales standing upright on his head, mouth dropping open and red tongue - which, at that point, was uselessly cutting a swath through the underbrush – would have been hilarious had it not been so unnerving.

But it didn't faze Midnight's compatriots.

Yoshi rolled his eyes and turned back to face Albert. "They don't know, Albs?" he insisted, slightly anxious.

The other Yoshi shook his head, his scales clinking melodiously against each other with this small action. "No, I don't but I'm pretty sure he's around here somewhere," he filled them in before abruptly disappearing into the mist….uh, trees.

Midnight stared at Yoshi once Alber had gone. "Is it just me, or did he do that disappearing act on purpose?"


	5. The MYL

It was a short, uneventful while later when the two of them returned to home of the Yoshi tribe. Lila had taken it to herself to pull a coconut completely from its comfortable bunch in a palm tree and had seated herself on the ground beside the large, vine-ridden hut. The travellers were gathered in a semicircle around her, knees to the ground and hands clasped in excitement. It was amazing to think how, with the aid of a single coconut that kept flipping from one green hand to the other, Lila could cause such astonishment and flabbergasted-ness to take root in their minds. Aside from the usual web of legends and folklore, rumours and tales were tangled in with her stories; most importantly, a tale of the Mythical Yoshi of Legend.

"It is said that he arrives each and every night to suck at the sweet juice from the Tinkleberry plant," Lila declared to the travellers, her eyes roving from one to the other as she proceeded with the tale. Midnight, being who he was, knew she didn't believe the tales herself – though, without doubt, every Yoshi on the island knew he existed. His imagination burning, an inner flame inside him, Midnight dropped to the ground and crossed his legs in a single fluid movement. He was sitting beside Daisy, who in turn was squatted down next to Luigi. Her hands clasped, her tiara lopsided on her mess of dishevelled brown hair, her mouth dropping slightly at the wonder of it all – yep, you could indeed tell it was Daisy's first time on Junglestream Island.

"His shadow graces the leaves of the jungle as he feeds, twisting and twirling with every step – he is a dancer, alive in his own land; strong, wild, free," continued Lila. "He leaves at dawn, to reappear at eventide." Now her face was cast in shadows, thought Midnight. With all that shade dappling her turquoise-hued snout, she could be the Mythical Yoshi of Legend herself. No one seemed to know what colour he was; some distinguished red, others green, yet others blue. He may have been one solid colour or a million and one – for all they knew, Joro could be the Mythical Yoshi of Legend. It was possible, strangely. Not that Midnight believed it – it had been going on since before he had been born. Had it been Joro, he would have revealed himself by now.

"No one knows who he is, or why he's here," the green Yoshi chieftainess continued. "Some say he once was a normal Yoshi, but bonded to this island by means of a wicked and cruel enchanter's spell. Others say he is the creator, the roamer, the avenger, he who made this land and must live on it forever.

"Still others refuse to believe in his existence, though his shadow can be seen flitting through the trees every other night." Her eyes glowed in the darkness; she lifted the coconut to her chest and shook it gently so that milk sloshed inside and something hidden within its chocolate-coloured depths rattled.

"It is known, though, that when his feet are seen even lightly touching the ground during drought, peace is restored to Yoshi's Island. The crops grow once more and the grass revives; instantly, our world is transformed from a multitude of yellowing, easily-snapped stalks to a thriving, warm, living jungle of green, thickly sprinkled with flowers and vegetation of every colour and size.

"When his figure appears, dancing happily over the hilltop where some Yoshis' huts are built, the island can be carried from a time of periodical flooding to a time of harvest and happiness. The water instantly recedes into the river; the grass dries quickly under the stare of the mystical Yoshi. The waterfall shrinks to its normal size and the earth lives once more. We emerge from the shadows and breathe again, all thanks to the Mythical Yoshi of Legend."

Her speech done, Lila took a deep breath as her face flushed with pride. The travellers cheered and clapped wildly as she took a bow before dropping down to the ground again. She absently ran her hands over the thick tufts of small bushes; then, something strange seemed to have disturbed her. She looked up instantly, springing to her feet.

"Look up, for there goes the blue jewel peacock. Catch her feathers as they fall; they bring good luck, happiness, and health to all who wear them tied around their necks."

Within the space of two and a half seconds, Mario had sprung to his feet and was eagerly reaching out for some of the feathers. In the next instant, Daisy jumped up, pulling Luigi along with her. They were followed by Peach, who - though one would expect to be more prim and proper - had pulled off her crown and was raising it up to the blue jewel peacock just as her figure cut through the sky.

She was beautiful, that blue jewel peacock. She was a large, spreading figure: from outstretched wingtips to the talons on her feet, she measured over two metres long. A magnificent, decimetre-long crest curled out of her head, sparkling with small, ruby-like spots that twinkled brightly in the sunlight. Two large green patches surrounded her eyes, glowing like darke emeralds. Her tail was yet more curling and marvellous than the crest behind her head; streaked with gold, violet, scarlet, emerald, ruby and orange, it seemed to glow in the daytime light. The rest of her body was, of course, a silky, midnight blue.

The peacock let a happy, alert cry resonate from the tips of her hooked, yellowish beak. It was the kind of call a phoenix would make, the kind of call that seemed to reverberate inside your heart and soul. She sliced through the celestial heights at rapid-fire speed, and, during her passing, shining blue feathers came spiralling gently down, drifting through the air - so close yet so far. Luigi reached for one and found it seemingly unattainable, so he gritted his teeth and went up on his toes, managing to catch one just seconds before it landed gently to the ground.

The bird passed in a flurry of feathers and movement; several more of the good luck charms lay scattered on the floor. Mario bent down to reach for another one, but Lila placed her hand around his gloved wrist. "They lose their good luck that way," she explained when the plumber gave her a quizzical look. "So, us Yoshis use them for another, better reason."

"What reason?" Peach asked. She had found a coconut innocently lying on the ground and had smashed it in two, tossing one of the halves away. Now she was picking up the silky, midnight-blue feathers as fast as she could and throwing them into the other half. "Can they heal the sick?"

"No, nothing like that," Lila replied with a laugh, "though that would be great, wouldn't it? No, we use them to summon the Mythical Yoshi of Legend."

"We throw them on the ground at sunset; sometimes in the jungle, sometimes at the shore, sometimes in front of the tribe home. Then, when the world is tinged orange and hued yellow from the light of the setting sun, we call him. Sometimes, we do it during nightfall." She winked playfully. "But we only do it once a month. If you come, you can see it happening tonight."

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"I thought that some Yoshi's didn't believe in the Mythical Yoshi of Legend," Luigi confided in Yoshi as the two of them walked over to the seashore that evening. "How could they not if he appears once a month?"

"They think he's just one of the natives," his rideable dinosaur explained patiently. "That he's just another Yoshi in disguise. After all, he's only been here twenty-eight years."

"Twenty-eight years?"

Yoshi nodded. "He's still a kid in our years - about fifteen or so - though why he does what he does is anyone's guess."

Luigi found himself murmuring absently as he focused on the shoreline. "He's magical." The statement was accompanied by a little shiver that ran down his spine. It wasn't long before the shiver turned into an all-out, glacial sensation that sent his big nose trembling and mustache shaking. It felt like someone was raking their cold, clawlike hands down his back-

"GHOST!" shouted Luigi and began running wildly, his hands lashing through the night time air. Yoshi snarked and would have watched the insane spectacle, but he did the (cough - supposedly - cough) right thing and tackled the younger plumber to the ground.


	6. A Monthly Ritual

"Oh, it's just you two." Peach stood in front of the pair, one eyebrow raised. "We were wondering where the insane laughter was coming from. Right, you'd better hurry. The Yoshis are just about to summon the Mythical Yoshi of Legend."

"I told you he exists," Luigi muttered to Yoshi as the two of them scampered over the soft sand, but he was grinning. Sure enough, pattering footsteps behind him and a hand on his shoulder told him that all was well.

Every Yoshi on the island was there, even those who were dubious of the existence of the Mythical Yoshi of Legend. They were accompanied by the wayward travellers, Parakarry and Porgal. "This is going to be fascinating," Parakarry declared as he winged over to a small sand dune on the shoreline, dropping down next to his great-uncle. He stuck one hand in his shell, his brow furrowed as he concentrated. His tongue was sticking slightly out as he rummaged through his things, muttering under his breath. Within a matter of minutes, Parakarry had crossed his legs, a sketchpad perched on his lap. Last but not least, he removed a sharpened wooden stake from the depths of his shell and excitedly began scrawling. "I'm going to have to add these notes to my log."

"Yes, indeed, my intelligent great-nephew. Yes, indeed." Porgal squinted toward the lavender-tinged midnight-blue horizon, as if scrutinising the skies. "That is, of course, presuming the Mythical Yoshi of Legend does exist."

"Of course he does!" retorted a taken-aback Parakarry, but Porgal only shrugged in reply.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Meanwhile, Lila was talking with Alber, Mera and Violet.

"This is your first time to see us summon the Mythical Yoshi of Legend, isn't it, Alber?" Lila asked the small red Yoshi, who nodded excitedly.

"Yeah!" he cried happily, clapping his hands. "I always wanted to see what he looks like."

"Well, his scales shine all sorts of colours," Mera pondered thoughtfully. "It's really beautiful at sunset or when the moon is incredibly bright and shining."

Violet glanced upward, her cheeks flushing for unknown reasons (actually, she'd caught sight of Yoshi chatting with the travellers), up at the moon, which was the colour of churned milk at this hour. "Well, it's too pale now," she told the other three, "but I think we'll still be able to see them."

"He's never missed it once in every month of these twenty-eight years," Lila explained to the younger Yoshis as they walked along the seashore. It was the Yoshis' habitual custom to sit on the shore rather than in trees or the vine-ridden benches they had built for travellers while they watched the Mythical Yoshi of Legend do his thing. "Even during storms and some of the worst Junglestream weather ever. He'll be here."

Alber glanced eagerly at Violet and Mera, his blues eyes shining, glowing. "Is that true?"

Mera rolled her eyes playfully at him and winked. "You can bet your boots on it, Alby."

The young Yoshi glanced down at his berry-blue boots, wriggling as he tossed back his head and midnight scales in anticipation. "Wouldn't be a good idea, though."

"No, of course not," Lila acknowledged with a laugh as she dropped to her knees. In that sense, Lila was different from most Yoshis – when the Yoshis were watching and waiting from the Mythical Yoshi of Legend on these wonderful Junglestream nights, she never sat. She always squatted or kneeled instead.

When the Yoshis were sitting side by side and neck to neck with the travellers, the Yoshi chieftainess raised one hand for silence. The buzzing voices stopped; the hum that filled the air dissipated. Lila glanced at each and every one of them behind her shoulder, just as the chatter dispersed. When everyone - humans, Yoshis, Paratroopas – had been looked at in the eye by the chieftainess, she gave a small nod. Instantly, Lila delivered the rousing cry for the Mythical Yoshi of Legend:

"Feathers!"

It was an amazing midnight stream of blue jewel peacock feather upon silken feather, all streaking toward the fine grains of sand that made up the far end of the shoreline; all clashing, drifting, spiralling, floating, spinning, zooming, floating, coasting, cruising, smashing, surfing, cutting, wafting toward and with each other, a seemingly neverending waterfall of feather after feather after feather. They were caught in a single, warm updraft, tossed toward the Yoshis; they were then chased back down by the wind – to be chased back up again.

They finally came, drifting, toward the thickly-knotted crowd – and suddenly pressed deeply into the sand, sinking into its granular smoothness. A great hush fell over the onlookers, which had been previously crying out and yelling in uncontrolled excitement. Finally, the last feather had been sunken into the subterranean - and then, out of the shadows, a figure appeared.

It was exactly as Lila had said it would be. He was a tall figure for his fifteen Yoshi years of age, slightly taller than the chieftainess - but man! The way that guy could dance was simply amazing. He span and pirouetted, jumped and streaked, waxed and waned, elusive as the moon itself in his time of honour. Just as Mera had assured the young Alber, he did indeed shine with every colour of the rainbow – his scales glittered, shined, shimmered, glowed, brightened and darkened with every feather of the blue jewel peacock that floated his way or was updrafted in another direction. He appeared, disappeared, materialised, vanished, as untouchable as the setting sun itself – or so it seemed to everyone in the vicinity.

Finally, he stopped, his underside - paler than the rest of his sparkling, rainbow-coloured body but just as colour-shifting - rapidly heaving up and down as his arms slowly extended from his long body. His tongue was out and splayed across the shore, so much like a bent and twisted length of liquorice. The scales behind his head, so multicoloured and vivid under midnight's light that it was hard to discern their true colour, were small and rounded; they were triangular, all right, yet they ended in smooth stubs rather than points. But, in spite of his body's ever-changing colours, you could tell what colour his eyes were: a jumping, dancing, dark cerulean blue that literally brightened and darkened with the moon and his scales.

The Mythical Yoshi of Legend grinned, nothing but happiness in his eyes. His lengthy tongue flopped feebly on the shore, but still lay, snaking along the ground like a ruby-coloured snake.

"Mythical Yoshi of Legend!" he cried, and with that disappeared.


	7. Small Talk

"So, wha'd you think, Albs?" Mera asked conversationally.

The young Yoshi's eyes were wide and white -- a lot whiter than usual, at any rate. "It was… wicked!" Alber cried finally, resorting to a word that we've heard loads of times in the first Harry Potter movie. "It was so absolutely awesome!"

"Slow down there, Alber," laughed a young green Yoshi named Roberta as she came near. She placed one hand on the young Yoshi's back, but he didn't cease jumping. It was only when Roberta delicately rubbed one her ridged red scales on his shoulder that he ceased his joyful bounding, though he was still wriggling nonstop.

"That's Alber for you," Violet grinned as she stared down at the young Yoshi. "Always excited and bountifully happy, especially now that he's seen the Mythical Yoshi of Legend."

That calmed him down. Instantly, Alber's scales stopped their writhing and he looked up at them with wide eyes. "I get to watch him every month from now on?" His voice was quivering slightly, Mereda noted as she took her time answering him.

"Yes, every single time that he comes," she replied kindly, a gentle – yet uncharacteristic -- smile on her lips. "Including when us Yoshis are in some sort of trouble."

"Lucky us, eh, Alber?" Roberta smiled and patted the young one on the head, who nodded excitedly back. "We get helped by the Great One himself in times of danger."

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Later, the colourful Yoshis converged with the travellers near the shell-specked shoreline.

"So, what's your opinion, Louie?" Yoshi deviously asked his rider's green-clad brother, who moaned and held his face in his hands.

"Please-a don't call-a me that, okay, Yoshi?" he explained politely to the dinosaur. "I don't-a really-a appreciate that-a nickname."

"Fair enough," came his answer with a passive shrug, "Even I have some goodness in me, after all."

"All right, then." Luigi amended matters. "So, as for what I thought…" He trailed off as he brought his eyes up to the sky. "It was…" He scrutinised a cloud as he murmured about the Mythical Yoshi of Legend's coming to himself. "There's-a one-a word to describe a-what happened before. Magical. That's-a it. One-a word. Magical. And-a wondrous, of course."

"Yep." Yoshi's reply of agreement was monosyllabic. "And he comes, eighteen times a year."

"I thought-a you guys a-said he only comes-a once every month," came a voice; Luigi and Yoshi both turned round to see Mario walking to them with Peach, Daisy, and Parakarry. "That only makes twelve times a year, not eighteen."

"Yeah, but then again, we have floods and droughts at least five or six times a year," he shrugged, then made a face. "Spring and summer are the worst."

"It sounds weird to me that you guys can have a drought here," Daisy puzzled. "I mean, most of the island is covered with plant life, right? It seems to me that there's always good weather here."

"Well, there is _usually_," Roberta replied after some thought. "But look up," she ordered, indicating the mountains that soared at the other end of the island with a jerk of the head.

The glare from the sun was blindingly bright; Daisy shielded her eyes with one hand. That made it kind of hard to see, but nevertheless she looked up and saw that the chocolate-dark peaks were….swirling? How could it be? As she strained her eyes for a closer look, though, she saw that it was not the mountain swirling, but rather sand whirling in a wild typhoon around it. The flying particles had nigh-completely filled the air, turning the bright blue cloud-dotted expanse to a swirling golden haze.

"See, it's like a sand-covered mountain," Alber explained matter-of-factly. He had finally come around from his bout of MYL-induced craziness and was now running one red hand through the ridged blue scales behind his head. "The sand's always there – about two or three times a year, usually during winter, the sand comes floating down because of the different weather.

"But floods are more common," he added as an afterthought.

"Hey, where's your uncle, Par?" Peach asked suddenly as she turned to Parakarry.

The Paratroopa's wingtips quavered slightly as he shrugged his amber shoulders. "He went off. Said something about 'exploring this wonderful island.' "

"See, I _told _you this place is a tourist attraction," Lila grinned at Violet and Mera as the threesome came up behind the little group. "(Almost) perfect weather, all year round."

"Well, I have to agree with that much, if Great-Uncle Porgal likes it," Parakarry said with a nod. With a slight jolt, the Yoshi chieftainess realised that the pad was still in his clenched paw; presently he riffled through the pages, sifting through the contents, until he neared a blank one. Decidedly the mail Paratroopa of Dry Dry Outpost perched upon a nearby rock that was about as big as his body from one wingtip to the other before scribbling the title (which, though only Mario could read it from his vantage point, read "JI Geography") and looked up at Lila.

"Lila…" he began, his expectant goggled eyes big in a puppy-dog kind of way. "Info?"

She took the pad from a very shocked Parakarry as she laughed in reply: "Of course, mail Troopa dearest. As a matter of fact, I'll do it for you."

Parakarry's eyes were wide as the Yoshi finished off the work – which would require three times what he'd already written – that didn't only include the island's geography, but also a full-colour map, the different kinds of Yoshis on the island, the myths and legends, the food, the wildlife and nature, and everything else he would need to know about Junglestream Island.


	8. When Questions are Asked

So, here we are. Again," Mario announced as the small group of human travelers arrived to the headquarters (nah, just kidding; it was the tribe home) to spend the night, yet again. Parakarry, on his hand, would be sleeping outside under the stars with his great-uncle. 

This was the place where the peach of the Mushroom Kingdom had woken up her plumber (who she had once lovingly called 'my hero'; in result, the plumber had beamed and beamed before he had tottered to the floor) with her pasta-smelling perfume.

"To spend the night." Luigi poked his head into the doorway, wrinkling his nose as a horrible smell came to the travellers' nostrils. "I think this is yours, Mario. It smells like rotting…uh…meatballs?"

"Meatballs don't rot," replied his older brother somewhat crossly as he made his way past the thick knot of Yoshis and humans. There, he perched on the leaf-draped bed and pulled up the covers before pushing down below them. "They just start to smell a bit after a while."

"A _lot_," corrected Roberta with a laugh. "Well, I'll be off to bed." She addressed the whole group. "See you guys tomorrow morning." And with that she left, a small green figure quitting the ranks of a rainbow-coloured mass.

"I guess we'd better bring you guys to your rooms, too," Lila explained somewhat regretfully to the travellers. "Peach's room is just around the corner."

Within a matter of minutes, everyone was asleep. Except for a certain few, anyway.

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"Well, the travellers seem to be happy," remarked Canberra to the young Cloudfluff, who nodded.

"Mm," he agreed. "I wonder how long they'll be staying?"

They were all sitting in a small back room – actually, it was a small dining room. Rather a normal one by Yoshi standards, the kind that they kept in case of guests (Most of the time, they themselves ate in the tribe's main eating room, where the story started. If they had more than three travellers, though, the Yoshis' traditional island law stated that they would eat in the tribe main eating room. Otherwise, several dining rooms were scattered throughout the Yoshi's blooming tree stump of a tribe home.) Lila was there, of course; so was an assortment of Yoshis, in addition to yellow-amber Yoshi named Olivia.

"A few weeks, I think," Olivia said now, her legs swinging from under her chair. "Actually, I'd love it if they could stay here for even longer."

Elsa wrinkled her snout. "What, three weeks isn't long enough for you?"

"Relax, bud." Joro calmed her down by pressing one hand gently to her pink arm. "Actually, three weeks is plenty, I think."

"We have to show them the rest of the island, though." There was a smug grin on Gabe's face. "They ain't seen nothin' yet."

"Well, actually, Mario…erm…had an adventure here on the way to Peach's castle after I rescued him from Kamek and the Toadies," Yoshi pointed out, but the young blue Yoshi only shrugged in reply.

"A few months is nothing compared to eight years," he answered, cocking his head deviously to the side.

"Either way, I'm glad they're here." Canberra took a long sip of her tea. Yoshis' Island was famous for its tea; steamed up from the lava-filled volcanoes that grew nearby, the tinkleberry plant's berries were ripe and purple with just a fiery tingle. Their leaves were used to make the famous Yoshis' Island maple syrup and, as Lila had mentioned earlier, the juice that could be poured out from its delicate, iris-type flowers made an excellent refresher, if a little too strong for humans (thankfully, though, it wasn't three quarters as strong as the maple syrup). The tea, though, had a taste that satisfied all four taste bud types, in moderate doses, of course: sweet, sour, salty, and bitter. It was the sort of thing Canberra would drink, even though, in Yoshi years, she was technically a kid.

Meanwhile, something very strange was going on.

Midnight was staring down at the long table, his eyes squeezed almost shut, focused in front of him, as if he were staring down at his own hand, a midnight-blue mass lying absently beside a fruit-and-granola bar that the Yoshis kept in their larders. "Mythical Yoshi of Legend," he muttered to himself, inclining his head slightly so that his red scales glittered in the semidarkness. "Mythical Yoshi of Legend."

By now, all the Yoshis had seen him and were curiously watching, waiting. Alber, however, took things farther than the other Yoshis and placed his red hand on Midnight's arm. "You all right, Mid?"

But Midnight didn't even register that he'd heard the younger Yoshi – then again, maybe he hadn't.

Again, Alber patted the older Yoshi's arm, this time pressing one of his blue-booted feet upon his leg, hard enough so that Midnight was roused from his trance. He blinked his marine blue eyes as he looked up surprisedly at the younger Yoshi.

"What is it, Albs?" Alber cocked his head to the side and repeated the question, but Midnight shook his head slowly. "Am I all right? Well, I should think so. I was just thinking about the Mythical Yoshi of Legend, that's all."

"What about him, Midnight?" asked a slim green Yoshi named Tara. Accordingly, she was middle-aged by the island's standards, yet she looked younger than her age would tell. Oddly enough, her mate, Beran – a cerulean blue Yoshi who was the exact same age as her – looked his age.

"He came last night; it wasn't your first time," she continued. "You seemed all right then. What's happened now?"

"Well, nothing's happened…" Midnight glanced down at his swinging legs, as if he didn't want to look them in the face. "It's just that… It's just that… I want to find him."

Alber blinked. "That's a new one," he muttered under his breath. Then, catching hold of himself, the red Yoshi turned to Midnight, his eyes glittering in excitement. "He was so mysterious," he told him eagerly. "I want to find him, too."

At this point, Tara and Beran exchanged curious glances at each other, but no one seemed to notice.

"I can go with you two," Yoshi informed the other two. "It'd be great to talk to him, I think."

"So it's settled then." Everyone turned to see the Junglestream Island chieftainess cross her arms on the long low table, a light shining in her eyes. "You three are goin' out."


	9. Rescued by the Legend

"You sure you don't want to come with us?"

"Nah, it's all right." Daisy waved her hand vaguely and graciously in the air, as if it mattered not. "We'll stay and wait when you guys bring back the Mythical Yoshi of Legend."

"Well, I guess we'd better prepare, then," announced Midnight, turning his back to the other two. "Food!"

He sounded… er…demented? Anyway, Yoshi rolled his eyes and amicably pushed his friend's shoulder. "Life isn't all about food, you know, Midnight. This is only gonna take a day, not a month."

"Yeah, right," was Midnight's smooth answer as he cheerfully waved goodbye to the travellers and began setting off through the trees. Alber, however, took this as a good sign and bade them goodbye likewise, followed by a grumbling, muttering Yoshi.

"Come on, Yoshi, it was just a _tiny_ offense," Midnight protested when the scowling dinosaur's figure lagged behind his own. "I didn't actually didn't take any food, did I?"

"True," Yoshi agreed, allowing a small smile to curl his mouth as he looked at the thick, multicoloured knot of blue and red he knew to be his friends. "Very true."

"Well, we'd better start going, then." Alber's voice cut through their thoughts and they turned, just in time to see the young red Yoshi pluck a pod-shaped, Tinkleberry-filled leaf from a nearby stalk before his red form disappeared through the trees. Yoshi and Midnight hurried after him, their booted feet clumping on the green grass tufts in the chase.When the three of them were finally walking together under the cool, serene light of the jungle, Alber turned round and handed them some Tinkleberries. They chewed on the soft fruit wordlessly for a while, until the sound of cascading sapphire water met their ears-or whatever Yoshis have in place of ears, at any rate.

It was the waterfall that all young Yoshis had been taken to when they were babes, the one that was normally filled with the small, paddling bodies of the swimming young ones. Now, because of the arrival of the travellers on the island, it was totally and completely empty, but one thing remained; its cool waters reminded you of time, of eternity, of goodness that would never end. Or so were the thoughts, anyway, of Yoshi, Midnight, and Alber upon entering the clearing where it was situated.

The frothy waters were churning slightly in the pool they flowed into. The three friends paused at the water's edge, ears alert, eyes bright, as they listened to the sounds that assured everyone that "justice and love will always win!" Nah, just a bit of Dwarven Vows for you there (Tales of Symphonia, anyone?). Anyway, all was still and silent for a few moments as they listened to the waterfall's cool waters -- flowing... Ever flowing... Always, eternally, fovermore flowing...

Finally, their trance was snapped as they finished, magically and -- weirdly enough -- in perfect sync with each other. They exited the clearing and returned under shade of the jungle's trees, whispering among themselves.

"I hope we'll see him soon!" declared Alber as they headed in the opposite direction, throwing his arms in the air. "Mythical Yoshi of Legend, here we come!"

But, before a long time had elapsed, Midnight noticed that Yoshi was edgy again, jumping at the least crinkling of leaves or rustling of twigs. He was on tenterhooks, frightened and distracted in this newfound tension. The dark blue rideable dinosaur reached out to his friend in alarm, but he only skilfully pulled away.

"M-Midnight!" Yoshi stuttered as he avoided his friend. "Something's here, and it's not good!"

"What are you saying, Yosh? I mean, it's not like we're going to be captured by evil Fuzzies or something."

But a shadow that darkened their faces, cutting across their pathway, told them he was wrong.

"Eek!" Midnight let loose with that most feminine cliché-d cry when the big, hulking, spiked figure of a giant Fuzzy picked the three of them up as if they were mere rag dolls. It then proceeded to bounce through the trees as any Fuzzy would, its grotesque, misshapen mouth open to reveal several unevenly spaced, pointed teeth. Its wide eyes were goggling all around, rolling, at everything and nothing as it brought the Yoshis to its shoreside lair.

Yoshi, of course, being who he was, had an almost as cliché-d – though slightly more masculine - cry --

"Waaaaaah!"

But Alber was silent – silent, but not still. He was wriggling furiously in the grip of the gigantic Fuzzy, trying to stickt his ridged pointed purple-blue scales anywhere he could on the Fuzzy. Their enemy, however, had a thick skin – each thwack of his scales only rebounded on its forest-green hide.

They could feel themselves bouncing up and down with the creature as it bounded up and down through the heavily shaded jungle. Each and every jump rattled their bones in their sockets and sent the scales rubbing painfully upon one another. By the fifth jump, the tongues of all three were literally spilling from their mouths, drooping lifelessly -- ruffled slightly by the strong wind blowing – and one could remark their similarity to panting dogs.

Now the Fuzzy crashed to the undergrowth of a clearing on his seventh bound; the Yoshis dropped limply from its grasp. It appeared to be jabbering with some other large, spiky figures that had been clustered near the heavily tree-lined edge of the clearing; they came bounding forward as their Fuzzy approached.

_They're Fuzzies! No, of_ course_ they're Fuzzies!_ Yoshi mentally reprimanded himself. He made a small, careful mental note: _stop stating the obvious, whether out loud or otherwise. _

That thought in mind, Yoshi lifted his head from where he had been cruelly thrown into the bush-ridden undergrowth, his body a greenish wreck that lay, splayed, across the reedlike, easily-snapped foliage. What he witnessed then was more than scary – it was horrific, horrendous, and horrible, all rolled together into one.

The five giant Fuzzies had bounded their way through the weeded undergrowth and were swarming around a central area – from his position on the ground, it looked like a cauldron bubbling above a tiny campfire. Wait a minute… _A cauldron! How in the world's that possible?_ From where he was, he could see them dumping spicy herbs into the cauldron; gray-tinged bluish smoke wafted out of the thick black potions pot, spiralling into fluffy, distorted shapes. Every now and then, one of the Fuzzies would consult a large, leather-bound book that was propped up against the wooden structure that held the cauldron over the fire.

_Wha… What's going on? F-Fuzzies are annoying and mischievous, not evil and Yoshi-eating… Th-This makes _absolutely_ no sense… _Well, no matter how much sense it didn't make to the usually cheerful green dino, they were about to saved.

While the Fuzzies were cackling over their mysterious, bubbling potion, Midnight was the first to notice a glimmer of rainbow in between the trees bordering the clearing. He caught a glimpse of shining scales as the figure behind the outgrowth of Tinkleberry plants cut a swath of wrecked plant life as he neared them; Midnight struggled furiously in a Fuzzy's grip as one of the relentless newcomers toyed with him like a dog with a meaty bone.

The Fuzzy was tall and hulking, with an odd midnight-coloured hide that was strung with small Tinkleberry seeds; they clinked together as he came toward them, attached as they were by some thick cord made out of jungle leaves. The delicate sound flittered softly through the air as the Fuzzy carefully pulled Alber from his position on the ground, as if he were a particularly stubborn carrot he wanted to eat.

This was when the figure made his mark.

His feet pounding and flailing on the thick, knotty weeds, the hidden Yoshi abruptly soared up and onward, clinging just in time onto a nearby hanging vine as he did so. The vine creaked slightly under his weight, but the Yoshi was unperturbed; he merely pressed two booted feet onto a sapling in his line of landing. The young tree swayed slightly with the movement, but the Yoshi had gotten his leverage; he released his feet just in time as the vine went swinging past the now slightly-bent sapling. He glided easily once in the air, as if he had been doing it all his life. Within seconds, the Yoshi had jumped courageously from the vine, leaving it twisting in the air behind him.

Midnight, who had witnessed this very scene with the Mushroom Kingdom's widest eyes, allowed his mouth to drop open – tongue and all – and his body to cease wriggling in the Fuzzy's grip. He cried out faintly; the figure didn't hear him, but he obviously knew of their predicament.

"Leave them alone!" the Yoshi called from his vantage point lower on the grass, feet planted next to a gently-winding river that ran not far from where the others were. He raised his hands to his mouth before crying out again. "Leave them alone, you barbarians!"

Even though all three Yoshis were fighting to escape from the gigantic Fuzzies, Alber could still see the mysterious one as he stood, stock-still, on the brook. He was tall-looking; his age, Alber guessed, was around fifteen or so. His scales glittered and sparkled with every colour of the rainbow -- especially around his back, where any other Yoshi would have a saddle. This one, however, had nothing but row upon row of glowing scales. Every time he moved, his scales fanned against each other, rubbing slightly as they metamorphosed before Alber's very eyes. He could see it better now, could see the scales' colours fading before reappearing in dazzlingly bright starbursts. The starbursts were flickering, flitting across his scales, changing colours. Blue, yellow, red, green, orange, purple, violet, crimson, mauve, scarlet, celestial, baby blue. Turquoise, pumpkin, butter, amethyst, aquamarine, daisy. Iris, gold, emerald, sapphire, cherry, silver, peach. To Alber, it seemed like every possible colour in the world was there, glowing, glittering, shining on his scales. That, of course, could only mean one thing…

In one instant, three voices had added themselves to the din:

"Mythical Yoshi of Legend!"


	10. A Splash of Rainbow

I don't get it how a guy like you can live all alone in the jungle," Alber commented dubiously to the Mythical Yoshi of Legend. The four of them were walking through the jungle and back to the tribe settlement some time later. "You're so… friendly! And nice!"

"Yeah, but I'm shy around strangers, remember?" was the reply as the answerer shrugged modestly. "When I first met you guys, I was so scared!"

"But still, you saved us!" Midnight added to the mix by tossing in his own retort. "I mean, you didn't look like you were having any trouble there, right?"

"Well, Mid, he _has _lived in the jungle for most of his life, you know." Yoshi reprimanded his friend gently, cocking his head to the side with a roguish wink. "It only makes sense that he knows how to take care of evil Fuzzies."

"Well, yeah; that's actually it," the Mythical Yoshi of Legend put in before either Alber or Midnight could answer. The other three Yoshis stared at the tall, glowing rainbow figure, surprised. It didn't befit the shy Yoshi to cut in like that, even though he was just saying the truth, what was on his mind. "For my whole life, I remember living by the beach, or else in the forest or the jungle. I always wanted to talk to you Yoshis, but I was so shy. I just hung around between the tree trunks and everything."

"Yeah, we saw you some nights, when you went to suck the Tinkleberry juice." Alber brushed one hand past his sleek red scales. "Still, though," he added wistfully, looking up at the sky. "You always came when there was a flood or a drought. To save us Yoshis."

"I did," the Mythical Yoshi of Legend acknowledged calmly, ducking down his head as his tail slashed at an overhanging branch, though it may have just been because he was embarrassed. "You Yoshis always think I'm magical or omnipotent or whatever, but I'm not. I'm just… Rainbow."

"Rainbow?" queried Midnight, and he nodded:

"When I was a little Yoshi, barely hatched, I liked to think of myself as the rainbow that shined on the jungle's treetops. I knew I wasn't, of course, but I really liked playing make-believe back then." A pause for a mischievous, apologetic grin. "I still do, now that you mention it."

"There's one thing I don't understand, though." Midnight's voice rang, straight and true, past the babble of excited Yoshis that signified their arrival back to the Yoshis' village. "How did you know to save us from floods and things, back when you were a little kid?"

"Well, when I saw you guys in trouble, I knew something was up. I'd noticed from before that the sun wasn't shining and the rivers were swelling. When the flood's rain clouds came out, I put two and two together. I knew I had to do _something._" Rainbow grinned again at them all, leaning back and shaking his scales as he did so. Liquid, crystalline droplets of water went raining down on the soft, leaf-scattered ground under him, splashing the other three in the process.

Yoshi grinned as the flood of water washed over him, just cresting the top of his ridged red scales. "You may want to be careful there, bud."

"Oh, and we forgot to say, thanks for saving us," Alber chimed in, tipping his own head to one side so that the water dripped from his scales. "Or else we would have been Fuzzy supper."

Rainbow smiled happily.

"No problem," he said, and that was that.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"I have to say, Rainbow, I'm really, _really_ grateful that you came to help us."

He nodded at the Yoshi chieftainess's praise and thanks, though his cheeks were reddening slightly in shyness. "It was nothing, Lila," was Rainbow's causal reply. "I saw Yoshis in trouble. I helped them. They brought me here. In short, a piece of cake."

"Or so it would seem." Olivia was smiling slightly as she leaned her feet against the table and reached out one hand to grasp a large slab of Yoshi maple syrup-flavoured fruit cake, which she then proceeded to toss into her mouth. "And I mean that literally."

"And now I shall attempt to quote my mom," began Elsa, and everyone turned to look at her, sitting not-so-quietly with Violet, Meredith, Roberta, Tara, and Beran. "Ahem." With that, Elsa proceeded to launch into her one-of-a-kind adult Yoshi imitation. "_Olivia, please don't put your feet on the table. Your boots leave prints on it, and everyone knows that isn't good for the woodwork_."

"Very funny," commented Tara shrewdly, and Elsa paled in embarrassment. "Though you have got a point," she went on; the surprised but happy pink Yoshi puffed her chest out, eyes rapidly closing in relaxation.

"Why, thank you, Tara, for not criticising my wonderful imitation." Her right eye flicked open and shut for a brief wink. "Some people would." She threw a somewhat reproachful look to her mother, a sky-coloured Yoshi named Sheila, who groaned in joking annoyance.

"Elsa," Sheila began, thickly layering her voice with a scolding, reprimanding tone. "If you do one more imitation of me…" She broke off, shaking her head in mock fed up-ness.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Meanwhile, Lila was clearing her throat loudly.

"To get back to it, I think Rainbow here deserves applause from all the Yoshis assembled here now, and everyone else when they get back. They might not even be staying here today if he hadn't saved us during the floods and droughts that there have been in recent history." She grinned and held up her silver chalice.

Sure enough, a smattering of loud applause and some wild, unrestrained cheering resonated throughout the room. Rainbow blushed, stood and quickly took a bow before dropping back down to his seat, all the while being slapped loudly on the back by a happy Canberra. Gabe, on his part, was whacking Rainbow's shoulder with an excited whoop.

"Thanks, guys," Rainbow whispered to them, the faint inklings of a smile curving his slightly reptilian features. "It's really kind of you to do all this for me."

"You saved us so many times!" cried an excited Gabe (Man, is this guy ever happy!) with the Yoshi world's hugest grin. "We had to help you somehow."

"I appreciate it, too," added Canberra with a small grin. She patted Rainbow softly on the shoulder; the latter blushed. "It was more than I could have done."

Rainbow's blushing was more of, so to say, a darkening than an actual reddening; owing to his glittery firework-popping scales, which could be hot pink one second and could metamorphise to olive-green the next. Even if he'd managed to hold his colour down for a few seconds (which – I tell you now – was impossible), it wouldn't have helped much, seeing as he was blushing so hard the darkening would have just switched to any colour befitting the situation. But why was he blushing? Easy. The reason was a weird infatuation that was stirring deep within him. Translation: Rainbow liked Canberra. A lot.

"Pursuit of love, as it always seems to me." Midnight grinned, sneakily, craftily, and hugely, as he tipped his stool back. The vine-ridden seat seemed on the verge of snapping on the pole that held it up for a moment, but then was righted into place as Midnight hopped down from his lofty perch. "Anyway," he continued, smoothly rubbing one blue scale back into place as his teeth shone with seemably all their worth, "I do declare, Rainbow likes Canberra."

"You know, that isn't the nicest thing to say about a person," Violet chastised reproachfully.

"Yeah, but 'tis true, is it not?" Midnight replied easily.

"Er -- dude, there, she's got a point." Elsa cocked her head to the side as she glanced severely at the purple Yoshi.

"Guys," Yoshi groaned, putting his head in his hands, "Can't we just leave Rain alone? I think he has enough on his plate already!"

"You mean in between his scales," Alber corrected, then giggled. He turned to Midnight. "But Yoshi's got a point – I think we should leave him alone."

"Yeah, Mid, you have to listen to us." Olivia twisted her head, rubbing one of her yellowy-orange scales. "So maybe Rain likes Canberra, but everyone knows you like Mera."

Instantly, all the colour drained out of Midnight's face. The young Yoshi pulled the skin of his neck nervously (as seen on the Simpsons) before proceeding to duck out of sight. Mera rolled her eyes as she poked her own head under the table.

"See, Midnight? I like you too. Now, if you don't want the parents to notice that, you'd be better off leavin' 'em alone."

It didn't take a genius to notice that Mera was blushing as she said that, but, then again, so was Yoshi as he exchanged eye rolls with Violet.


	11. Yoshi for Adoption

"Are you sure there's nothing we can do to help you, Rainbow? I mean, you've helped us so many times."

Rather than denying the offer as he usually would, the Mythical Yoshi of Legend now seemed to be thinking about it. "Well," he began slowly, his head resting on his cupped palms, "See, the thing is, I've always lived alone. I know you guys really liked it every time I appeared above the waterfall or the riverbank and helped the flood go away -- and I can still do that – but…" He shrugged helplessly, eyes still on the ground. "But…well, you know, I was always too shy to go out and talk with the other Yoshis on the island. Now that I've been shown to you all…" A water-filled blink and a deep sigh that resonated from within his thin chest. "I…I want parents. Would it be too much to ask?"

At this, Lila seemed quite surprised. Quickly recuperating from her shock, the Yoshi chieftainess placed one hand on the young one's shoulder and tenderly smiled at him. "You don't have to be worried like that, Rainbow," she whispered softly. "I know just the Yoshis." That said, she disappeared in a flash of green light.

Rainbow blinked at Lila's disappearance. "What's she up to?" he asked Yoshi, who shrugged, then winked playfully.

"She's up to something, old buddy," he confided in his new friend with a gigantic grin.

"Yep, that's Lila for you." Violet was watching the Yoshi's green silhouette as she disappeared into the distance. "Always up to something."

"Usually a good thing," Gabe said knowledgeably, thwacking his tail once on the ferns that literally crowded the pathway from the tribe settlement. When Rainbow's expression remained confused, he tipped his head on one side and grinned happily. "Trust me on that one, Rainbow."

"Yeah – and she's realistic, too." Canberra was scrutinising the horizon with Olivia and Elsa. "Chances are she meant what she said."

"That's not realistic," Elsa pointed out, wrinkling her snout. "That's just literal."

"What Canberra and Elsa mean is that Lila is probably going to find you Yoshis who'll adopt you." Sensible Olivia tossed her head, rolling her eyes lightly at Yoshi.

"And if I know Lila, she'll do it fast." Roberta turned to wink at Rainbow from where she was perched on a large, moss-ridden stone that overlay part of the pathway. "Mark my words."

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Yes, Lila knew what she was doing.

Yes, Lila knew what she was doing.

Yes, Lila knew what she was doing.

'Scuse me there, folks. I just had to say that three times in a row for some weird reason. I--

Pikasqueaks: TCF, you're insane -- you know that, right?

Fanficcer: (muttering) Well, if you keep saying it – yes, I am going to know.

Pikasqueaks: (puffs out chest) Not only that; I also know I'm right.

Fanficcer: Aside from the obvious. (rolls eyes)

Pikasqueaks: Wow, I'm right?

Yoshi: (interrupting) Guys, can we get back to the story already?

Both: (in unison) No!

Yoshi: Wow, so it turns out you actually _like _crazinessand insanity.

Pikasqueaks: Well, duh!

Olivia: Still, I agree with Yoshi. Fanficcing craziness! (begins pounding chest like a weird cross between King Kong, Donkey Kong, and Monkey Fist from Kim Possible)

Midnight: Ollie, what are you doing?

Olivia: (still pounding chest) And don't call me that!

Pikasqueaks and Fanficcer: (glance at each other and roll eyes again) Let's get out of here!

Olivia: (staring at the twosome's disappearing figures) Aw, but I wanted everyone to--

Midnight: (throws down curtain from his sudden position above the stage set) OK, peeps, show's over. On with the fanfic!

That said, I cleverly disappear back into fandom. Heh heh heh.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Anyway, Lila knew what she was doing.

And so was demonstrated as she jogged quickly across the shoreline that encircled the whole island – not in a panting, hurried, rushed way, but rather in a soft and healthy dash across the sand that just told you she was a Yoshi, born and bred under the shining yellow sun.Her goal was, of course, two middle-aged Yoshis who stood in the distance, their figures rippling softly in the midafternoon breeze – one bright green, the other cerulean blue.

Tara and Beran.

Tara had one hand on Beran's shoulder; the two of them appeared to be watching the horizon, where a thick plum-coloured smudge that indicated a thick cluster of clouds was forming. The sun – pale yet strong in its own light – sent its light spiralling down, causing the Yoshis figures to be bathed in a gentle butter-yellow light.

Lila skidded to a halt just behind them, but softly enough so that her red boots cut on the soft terrain, making small rivulets of sand which flowed onto the boots of the Yoshi couple standing before her.

"Tara, Beran?" she inquired, rising and simultaneously pressing her feet into the outcropping where they were all standing. The sapphire-coloured ocean were splashing below in a small alcove made over time by its own unruly waters.

"What is it, Lila?" Tara turned at the sound, followed by Beran. She blinked, watching in polite nervousness as the younger Yoshi rubbed one of her ridged red scales thoughtfully.

"It's because…" Lila hesitated before looking up into the eyes of the couple. Her own were imploring and a somewhat desperate tone added to their normally calm blue because of her slightly wheedling tone. "It's because… Well, Tara, you told me you and Beran wanted to adopt…?"

Beran joined his mate further down on the outcropping, so that its pointed tip poked, abandoned and lonely-looking, toward the sea. Now he looked up at Lila, a confused look on his face but the dawn of understanding just breaching in its eyes. "Yeah, but who would we adopt? Rain--"

"Yes, exactly," replied Lila with a small smile, curbing the impulse to nod vigorously and jump for joy. (Though why she was so elated, she could not say.) "Rainbow."

A knowing look passed from Tara's soft olive-green eyes to Beran's blueberry swirls. "Yes," continued Beran, a slow smile spreading across his features, "Yes, we'll adopt."


	12. Homeboy

"And now we give them the surprise of their lives."

"What?" Mario scratched his head and pulled off his traditional red 'M' cap, revealing a mess of thick brown locks underneath. He then resumed scratching his head, all the while looking at Lila. "Are Tara and Beran going to be there too?"

"Yeah. They know already." Elsa filled in the red-clad plumber with a shrug, pink hands raised toward the light.

"Okay, but it seems to me that there have been a lot of parties going on since we first came here," Luigi pointed out, jamming his own cap back onto _his_ mop of black hair. He'd taken it off and unison with Mario and the two plumbers were now replacing them at the same time with the same cool, flowing motion. "We had one when Yoshi and the others found Rainbow. Do we really need another one?"

"Said who we're going to have a party?" was Lila's reply, and the seven travellers exchanged curious glances.

"So, we're going to ambush them?" Parakarry ventured timidly, and his response was a pleased nodding.

"On the pathway?" Porgal tossed his own question before Lila had a chance to speak. When she got her breath back and the older Paratroopa's mouth was safely shut, she decided to do the simple thing and nodded.

"This should be great!" Without waiting for any answers, Daisy clapped her ungloved hands together and swirled on the spot, her short dress a mass of light lemon-yellow frills. Luigi, almost without realising it, was watching her, transfixed, his mouth open slightly so that his tongue stuck out, saliva staining his mustache as he drooled.

"Daisy's right," Peach added, removing her crown with one hand and running the other through her untidy mess of soft yellow curls. (Wow, everyone seems to be taking off their headpieces today.) "This should be fun."

"In that case, what are we waiting for?" Mera added teasingly, and before you could say 'Goombas on the pathway', twenty or so Yoshis were running easily toward the horizon, accompanied by two hero plumber brothers, two princesses of respective kingdoms, and two winging Paratroopas.

---------------------------------------------------------------

"Rainbow!"

The startled Mythical Yoshi of Legend looked up at the sound of the voice, seeming surprised and yet pleased – downright odd, I might add, as if he had been expecting this. (Then again, maybe he had.) "Yeah, what is it?" he called back into the trees; only figures flitting from between the trunks returned in answer.

The slightly confused Yoshi wrinkled his snout and stamped the earth with one booted foot, shrugging as he did so. "I can see you moving in the trees. Can you come down, please?" he yelled back up to them, and giggling met his – uh, whatever Yoshis have in place of ears.

"Oh, sure. I mean, it's not like the power's not in us." A rather surprised Rainbow allowed the appalled amazement to appear on his face as a single figure detached itself from the branches: Lila. The green Yoshi appeared to be alone, but, then again, looks can be deceiving.

"Lila…" Rainbow warned, glancing quickly upward, in the direction of the treetops. The only thing he could see were vines, vines, and more vines, which – oddly enough – began spiralling down in his direction.

Now, he was more than confused – he was also frightened. But… Despite that, a deep, nigh-subconscious corner of his mind understood beyond the vines and smiled secretly within itself. His conscious self felt the quiet happiness from inside and was slightly confused, but acknowledged it nonetheless. So, in other words, Rainbow was confused, frightened, and a small but sure part of himself was feeling strangely joyful.

"Please come d-"

His sentence was cut off by a vine that flew right into his open maw. Spitting out the roping green plant life, he glanced upward and was taken by surprise when none other than Lila herself jumped from the trees and onto a nearby rock. Though, thought Rainbow as he stared at her, it was odd. Not Lila, but the fact that she was followed by two taller, older figures --

"Tara and Beran?" the Mythical Yoshi of Legend wondered incredulously, squinting in between the green-tinged trunks as the couple hopped down onto the thick stone, behind Lila. "What's going on?"

"Think," Tara replied with a grin, smoothing down one of her ridged red scales as she kicked at a vine, sending it cutting air toward Rainbow. "What's your greatest ambition?"

"To have a family, of course," was the Yoshi's quick reply as he smoothly evaded the swinging creeper.

Suddenly, the beginnings of realisation dawned on his face. His eyes widened and diminished rapidly, his tongue – which had been previously lolling listlessly in his mouth – rolled over the open edge of his maw as it dropped downward in shock and amazement, to drop with a soft thud on the jungle undergrowth. He stood, stock-still and stick-straight, arms held at his sides, fists rapidly clenching and unclenching. His boots, planted firmly in the soil, began quivering; the shivering waves sent ripples coursing all through his body.

"What d-do you mean?" Rainbow stammered, and Beran inclined his head toward Lila and Tara with a playful wink.

"Do we honestly need to tell you that?" he joked happily, slapping one hand down on Rainbow's shoulder.


	13. Fluff Stuff

"I a-guess, then, all's a-well ends-a well…" Luigi tipped back in his seat, the bottle of Junglestream Island maple syrup clenched tightly in his gloved hand as he posed one hand on Yoshi's snout. The rideable dinosaur nodded and took a bite of the strawberry-kiwi fruit pocket in his hand before answering.

"Yeah, exactly. Rainbow gets to live with Tara and Beran now, but something tells me that isn't the end of it." He gave a mischievous grin.

"We just have to wait, Luigi." Alber cocked his head to the side; beside him, Gabe downed the contents of his silver chalice in a single swig, though as for what was in there, nobody save him knew.

"Alber's right," the blue one agreed , nodding cleverly as he corked the flagon with a leaf-bound stopper that had been lying near his plate at the table. "We'll watch and wait and listen. That's what we've gotta do."

"When are we a-going back, I wonder?" Mario glanced at Luigi curiously. "It's-a been a while."

Instantly, the plumber turned on his brother with an agonised groaning. "Already? What are you-a saying, bro?"

"No, I was-a wondering what-a it's like when Yoshis adopt." Mario glanced at the circle of Yoshis sitting around them. "Anyone know? Any, you-a know, parties or anything?"

"No, not parties. It doesn't happen often, but when it does, Lila usually gives a welcome speech and the Yoshi goes down to sit with their new parents," Canberra replied easily, running one hand through her rusty-orange scales. "Then we applaud. It's not too common around here because most of the time the Myth -- well, Rainbow saved us from the floods and things. But some Yoshis did die, and their children lived with others. So, in the end, it all evens out." No one noticed then, but she suddenly flushed a deep shade of crimson.

"That makes sense," Peach muttered to herself, but she was frowning. "But I wonder what happened to Rainbow's real parents…"

"Well, he's Yoshi, right? Not like a god or anything?" Daisy asked everyone sensibly, and they all nodded. "Then, chances are, they either died or something happened to 'em. We could ask."

"No, that wouldn't be a good idea," Peach said slowly, mulling the problem over. "He might feel hurt or something. I suggest we let him tell us when he feels like it – and if he doesn't ever, that's all right, too."

Daisy looked slightly dismayed at this, but she allayed the loud groan just bubbling in her throat and shrugged her shoulders, tossing her tiara with one hand as she did so. The cut-gold circlet flew up into the air with a wind-chime type sound before falling back into the princess's open palm. "Yubba," she muttered. (It was a secret word she'd made up that meant 'yes.' Nubba, oddly enough, meant 'no.')

At this point, multiple groans resonated in the main room of the tribe settlement, ruffling the princess' hair, lifting the caps from the plumbers' heads, and rippling the Yoshis' scales, like an unwanted October breeze. Daisy, however, grinned (evilly).

"What?" she asked, to the additional groaning of everyone else in the room, "Is there anything wrong with intruding in Rain's life?"

"Stop-a that, Dai," Luigi moaned, holding his face in his hands. "Just because I-a like you doesn't a-mean--" He broke off, looking up at the shocked expressions on everyone's faces.

Finally, one single person broke out of astonishment and into reality.

It was Mario.

He slapped his younger brother's shoulder with a gigantic grin hidden under his black mustache. "Finally, you-a like somebody!"

Luigi carefully noted the redness spreading across Mario's cheeks. "Do… Do you-a like someone too?" he asked, oblivious to the eyes that were following his receding figure as it passed speedily through the doorway, grabbing the red-clad plumber as he did so.

Once Mario was in tow, Luigi dragged him past the open doorway and carefully observed his face for any sign of embarrassment (Actually, what he failed to notice was that his own cheeks had flush, giving him an unwonted appearance to an overripe tomato). "So, do you-a like someone?"

"Of course," was the answer, and though Mario's tone was more serious and knowledgeable, his cheeks were still glowing faintly in the faint sunlight pouring into the hallway where they stood. "Guess-a who."

"Peach?" His expression was one half of amusement, half of shock.

"Well, duh," replied Mario, and his brother fake-gagged into the doorway.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Cloudfluff was thinking.

"Methinks there exists some way to help that young, besotted Yoshi," the sky-blue Yoshi declared archaically, gesturing to pine-green Nicky and periwinkle Lauranna as he did so. "A way to bring him together with his dear Canberra."

"Fluff, could you stop talking like that already?" Lauranna interrupted Cloudfluff's monologue; the young Yoshi turned to her confusedly. "Yeah, all right – so we know Rain likes Berra, but that's no reason for you to try and set 'em up." She paused for breath. "By the way, the word is 'playing matchmaker.'"

"That's two words," Nicky pointed out with a playful wink to Cloudfluff. "Anyway, can't you just see the cogs turning around in her head? You can tell, it's _her_ who wants to be the matchmaker." He giggled lightly, and Lauranna whirled on him; he shrunk back in veritable terror.

"Don't you _dare_ say that," she exclaimed, her eyes flashing as she rounded on him. "It's not nice, especially since--"

"Yeah, yeah, we all know you two like each other."

Instantly, they both turned to Cloudfluff – it was his utterance, after all. The Yoshi observed them critically, tipping his head to once side as he did. "Well, it was obvious, no?"

The red from Lauranna's cheeks hadn't disappeared, though now it was more from embarrassment than anger. That done, she groaned loudly and disappeared into the trees, a fast blue blot in the distance. Nicky stared after her for a moment; then, he too, disappeared into the distance.

Cloudfluff stared after them, a smile flickering on the edges of his lips. "Well, they're running," he figured aloud as he gazed at the two silhouettes, rapidly receding into the distance. "So, that must mean my hunch was right." He shook his head, grinning, as he turned around, to head toward the tribe settlement. "Hah, I guess everyone has their own true love."


	14. When Plots Converge

True love, as in, well… romance, of course. The sort of thing that, according to Da Book of Rules (Fairly OddParents! Yay!) can't be interfered with. And, as Cloudfluff had mentioned earlier on, everyone has someone they love. Well, not everyone, but a lot of people. Yoshis, too. Which, of course, included –

Lila!

Yes, you heard -- sorry, read -- me right. Lila liked somebody.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

The Yoshi chieftainess was sitting at the edge of a cool, calm river, staring at her reflection in the water. Her face shimmered before her, thinking, pensive. She looked confused as well, but that didn't bother the green Yoshi as she pondered her problems. She had things to think over, and this was Lila's way of doing it.

Unsurprisingly, as Lila was twenty-two in her years and I don't know how much in the Mushroom Kingdom's, she was considering having a mate. On the island, things were generally as they were with humans – the Yoshis, thought it was appropriate to mated once fully grown. And, Lila, of course, was a few years past her teens, still rather like a kid in some ways, so – she _did_ like someone her age. And yes, she was considering mating with him.

But who, though? Yes, I know, for all you romance fanatics out there – the thought is on your mind. Yes, so I shall tell you.

His name was…

Name was…

Was…

Thildon!

On the outside, Thildon was just your normal, average-looking Yoshi. His hide was a shade of one of the most powerful and vivid reds out there -- like a million blood-tipped rubies, Lila fancied thinking. His ridged scales were deepest black -- dancing shadows on the midnight air. But Thildon was, on the inside, one of the most gentle and caring Yoshis ever known.

Man! Lila was, like, crushing on this dude so much!

What? Oh, yeah… I can talk kinda like a hippie when I want to. Anyway…

She also thought Thildon liked her. At least – no, was that even possible? It was a crazy notion -- far-out, wild. But he _did_ give her an awful lot of gifts…

He had given her one every year, around wintertime, when snow was lightly dusting the tips of the palm trees and even the blue jewel peacock's magnificent plumage was a thick, cottony, snow-like shade of white. It was traditional for every Yoshi to give their family and friends presents around that time of year (their form of Christmas, lol!), but Thildon struck Lila's heart the most.

Her favourite present from him, especially, was the one he had given her last winter… It was a beautiful, soft, snow-coloured satchel made out of the same material the gigantic Fuzzies in the jungle used to store the herbs they collected for their cooking. No one actually knew what the material really was, but it was the softest thing to be found on the island. Thildon, using a special paste made from crushed Tinkleberry roots, had then just lightly covered the bag with blue jewel peacock feathers. They formed a kind of glossy plumage, like an almost fluffy blue coat that surrounded the small satchel, was now -- as it had for almost a year -- hung from her shoulder. When Thildon had presented it to her it had been filled with fruit – Tinkleberries, of course, as well as the many other different types of fruit that the island was famous for.

Lila patted the satchel reflectively now, feeling its smooth curves and curls flatten under her touch. She was thinking – Thildon was older than her by two of their years. He was shy, gentle, caring – they had never courted before, so she would have to be careful…

But Lila, being who she was, knew that Thildon and she were meant to be together. She was sure about it too, in that assured, positive way. She would start the easy way…

Lila finally pushed herself away from the riverbank, spitting once into the river. The ripples undulated away from the soft ball of saliva, distorting her peaceful reflection and streaking dappled light across it. But she was who she was, and she knew that.

It was time to begin courting.

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"Who ever knew playing matchmaker could be so much fun?"

"We haven't even started yet." Rainbow gave Mera coy yet sly and mischief-filled smile. "And I'm glad I'm not with Canberra right now."

Mera grinned to herself. Rain was Rain – had he been with Berra right now, his cheeks would have resembled the colour of Mario's favourite pasta sauce. And with a shy guy like Rainbow, that could be disastrous.

It had been Violet's idea about playing the game of matchmaker; she had calmly noted the number of couples-to-be on the island and imagined the possibilities of settin' 'em all up together. No thanks Mera's overactive imagination, of course – though as to why she had chose Rain to be her partner in matchmaking, the yellow Yoshi was sure he had no clue.

(The actual reason was because he was shy and timid; once she got him into this, Mera was sure, the aura of shyness would slowly begin to fall away. She hadn't known him for too long – those, in addition to the fact that he could keep a secret, were the reasons. No joke, seriously.)

"And plus, how do we start?"

"Wha?" said Mera, her thoughts roused from those crazy, happy memories. "How do we start?" She suddenly jumped down from the large seaside stone they were both perched on, shaking the thick ridge of blue scales behind her head. "What do you mean, _how do we start?_" She gave Rainbow the world's most confused look. "With Lila, of course!"

And with that, she bounded into the mist.


	15. Matchmaking Matchmakers

"How?" asked a panting Rainbow as he caught up with the scampering Mera. "I mean, since when has Lila actually liked someone?"

"Forget to tell you, Rain. My bad." Mera gave him a gigantic grin as she skidded to a halt, sending mud flying in all directions. "Lila likes this red Yoshi named Thildon."

"Red Yoshi…" Rainbow paused as he thought about it, gently fingering his multicoloured scales. "Yeah, I've seen him. His scales are the same colour as rubies."

"Exactly!" cried Mera with a snap of the fingers, her eyes gleaming. "See, we know they like each other – they always give each other really nice presents at the winter giving time. Plus sometimes, I see Lila thinking – you know, her cheeks are reddish-pinkish, she's stroking the satchel Thil gave her last winter, and she's in deep thought. I can tell it has nothing to do with the tribe – if it did, she'd looked more concentrated. Instead, she just looks faraway and hazy...and (sigh)... in love."

Rainbow stopped her then, holding up a single hand to put an end to the answer. "OK, fair enough, but how do we actually _do_ it?"

"You'll see, you'll see," was Mera's answer as she bent down on the ground, absently picking some leaves from the undergrowth and sweeping them into a satchel she kept at her side. "After that, we'll do… Let's see… Nicky and Lauranna, and then, I guess, you and Berra, and then…"

"Then you and… that other Yoshi..." Rainbow could barely contain his giggles as he watched the expression on his new friend's face flick rapidly from one of vague thought to one of surprised amazement.

"Rainbow!" In one flowing, smooth movement, Mera pushed the Mythical Yoshi of Legend to the floor and stomped on his chest in pure Yoshi style.

"Mer!" He wriggled furiously under her blue-violet boots. "Furious, crazed yellow Yoshi! Stop working yourself into a frenzy already!"

"Well… Then I guess we'll have to do the others…"

Rainbow rolled his eyes and groaned loudly. Why in the world had he ever let her drag him into this?

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"Whoa. I knew Mera was crazy, but I never knew she was insane," remarked Roberta calmly, as if she were remarking upon a small but strong thunderstorm that had shaken the island. "Poor Rainbow!"

"Maybe we should help," began a somewhat flustered Olivia (and this is the Yoshi who was beating her chest like King/Donkey Kong before? No way!) as she headed for the horizon. "I mean, well, duh."

"No, they'll be all right." Elsa laid a restraining hand on her friend's shoulder. She flashed a look to the two as they trudged upon the shoreline – at least, Rainbow was trudging as Mera went into great gesticulating detail about something.

"Mm. You have to trust Elsa, Ollie," Roberta agreed with a nod as the figures of Mera and her new friend disappeared into the trees. "She might be crazy, but she wouldn't purposefully hurt Rain.".

"_Purposefully_," Olivia retorted, rolling her eyes. "She might actually hurt him by accident, you know."

At this point, both Elsa and Roberta turned to her with awed expressions on their faces. "Right," they replied in perfect unison as their heads shook with unified voices.

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"Lila – follow the path of blue spring flowers/Past the path your true love lies/Soft and red under summer showers/Go meet him now, before the sunlight dies."

"I'm not saying you're a bad poet, but seriously, Mera…" Rainbow's voice dubiously trailed off into the mist. "Is Lila really going to believe that?"

"Probably not, but knowing Lila, well… Let's just say she's incredibly curious and will probably follow the flowers we're leaving here anyway."

The Mythical Yoshi of Legend glanced down at the cerulean-blue tulips, roses and daisies they were tossing on the floor as they made their way over to a thick palm tree on the shore. The palm tree's wide, spreading branches provided perfect shade for those hot summer evenings and sweltering afternoons – Mera, of course, being who she was, was going to prepare another simple, one-stanza poem for Thildon, which would lead him to this very place. Then, according to her – BAM! They just had to sit back and let the sparks fly.

"But we're not going to watch them, obviously," she had assured Rainbow with the world's biggest smile. "Not only is that mean, it can also get pretty icky," she added, finishing her short speech with a fake gagging sound.

"Mer…"

"You have to trust me, Rain." She smiled engagingly at him. "Besides, you have no choice – I won't let you. First I have to set you up with Canberra."

Blushie on Rainbow's part.

"You like somebody, too," he muttered, and Mera's facial hide went an equal shade of red.

"Under the light your lost love lies/Search for her, by aid of the red blossoms that speck your way/Meet her where the sun shines from the sky/What's her name, hey, hey, hey." (Mera, you see, wasn't the world's best poet, though she could have passed for the Mushroom Kingdom's best grinner instead.)

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"I guess I'll follow the red flowers – I know it's not from Lila herself" -- more reddening of scales -- "but it must have to do with her, I figure."

Thildon felt reassured at the sound of his own voice. Sometimes -- as it had always been for the young red Yoshi – just talking aloud helps soothe you, calm you down. It worked like a charm now, allowing him to organise his thoughts into order.

With a sigh, Thildon bent down and examined one of the ruby-coloured blossoms that had been thrown, curled up, on the soil. Whatever it was, he was sure nothing bad would come out of it – even it was a prank. After all, pranks were for joking around, right? This meant that, in other words, as the blood-red Yoshi reasoned, he'd be better off by following the trail of red flowers. So, there, under the light of the spreading jungle trees, he followed the path of bright red flower tops, all the way to the beach.

The spreading sand unrolling around lazily before him, Thildon paused as he stared out in the distance. There, the trail of red flowers petered off under a large palm tree. Not just a palm tree. _The_ palm tree. The palm tree that was – supposedly – the meeting place of all young couples, where they met for the first time and smoothed out the bumps before true love was finally reached.

"Well, here goes nothing," said Thildon, facing the horizon as he mustered a small smile. "Onward, fair mate of nothingness, to the journey of a lifetime."


	16. Love will Save the Day

Lila carefully flipped over the sheaf of Yoshi leaf paper.

The paper - made from not Tinkleberry leaves but rather the vines of Huthel plants – was the standard of the island. The Huthel vines were picked, ripe and ready, at spring's crest – right in midseason, usually around March or so – and then dried out in the sunlight for a total of three days. Then, the vines were soaked in small barrels of water and sprinkled over delicately with spices from ground Piranha Plant leaves – this made them resilient and waterproof, but fairly decent for writing on. Last but not least, they were dried – not, this time, under the sun, but in a small cabin positioned near the tribe settlement, which served as a greenhouse. Under the cool light, the vines, which were dried for a mere three and a half hours, hardened slightly. Hence, the paper was made. It eventually grew brittle over time, though, which was why the Yoshis usually crossed the sea to the Mushroom and Beanbean Kingdoms when they wanted to write the manuscript of a book or something like that.

Because the paper hardened over a time, you could tell how old the sheaf was. Lila was an excellent tracker – judging by the fact that the vine-made sheet only crinkled slightly as she flipped it over, she could tell it was less than an hour old.

"Nothing on the flip side. I guess that means it's serious, then." Lila paused, staring intently at the sheaf, curled up innocently in one green fist.

"It looks like Mera's writing. It sounds like her, too – she's not the island's greatest poet, after all."

Lila smiled slightly as she scrutinised the short poem before reaching absently into the satchel Thildon had given her last winter. A short while back – her birthday, actually, which was April 23rd – the blood-red Yoshi had tenderly supplied with some real paper, flown over directly from Toad Town on one of the largest and most luxurious planes in the whole of Mushroom Kingdom (the _Shroom Express_). He had also given her a quill made with a single long, fluffy feather from the chest of the blue jewel peacock. In this area – like any swan's – the feathers were all long and curling, perfect for making writing tools with.

Lila carefully copied the poem onto the sheaf of paper. She knew perfectly well Mera was trying to set her up with Thil, of course, being nowhere near as naïve as he. But, as it was Mera, she knew – okay, scratch that, thought she knew – she was doing what was right.

The green Yoshi chieftainess then dropped the rewritten poem into a pouch of her satchel before setting out to follow the trail of red flowers.

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"One couple down, just about five more to go."

Rainbow rolled his eyes and turned from Gabe – who had recently, as it seemed to them, popped out nowhere – to Mera, who was barely concealing the gigantic grin covering her features. "Mer, you can't do this," he told her hotly.

"Oh yes I can." Mera stood stock-still, hands planted at her hips, staring at both Yoshis. Gabe, however, smiled peaceably.

"I know what really gets on Lauranna's nerves," he proclaimed happily. "I can tell you guys, if you want."

"How?" asked Rainbow, keenly interested in spite of himself.

"Easy," came the grinning reply, "But I need to do it with Alber and Midnight."

"Sure," began Mera as she rubbed on of her yellow scales absentmindedly. "We'll find Albs and Mid for you, won't we, Rain?" The last word was punctuated by an elbow poking itself sharply up hia ribs.

Rainbow rolled his eyes and tried to reply despite the pain that was creeping up slowly inside his ribcage. "Yeah, we will, Ga-"

"Nah, we're here already."

The trio of rideable dinosaurs turned to find, to their surprise, everyone's favourite blue Yoshi standing proudly amongst the jungle tree trunks, accompanied by a small but energetic young Alber.

"We were listening to you all along, see," Alber explained now, cocking his head to the side and thoughtfully rubbing one of his ridged bluish-violet scales. "And now we know."

"And now we're going to help you drive Lauranna up the wall," Midnight added with a devious grin.

"What do you have to do, exactly?"

Alber shrugged at the confused expression on Mera's face – it was odd, but when her snout was wrinkled like that, she actually looked smart. "It's pretty easy," – he put his hands up in a neutral motion -- "You just have to go like this."

This small statement was then followed by both Gabe and Alber moving their necks up and down in perfect unison, raising and lowering them so that their scales scratched feebly at thin air.

"It's weird, but I never really thought about it that way." Yoshi's best friend paused at the thought. He grinned suddenly. "I'm pretty sure I can do it in the world's most annoying way, though."

"So _that's_ why you brought him here," Rainbow said sarcastically, but the grin flickering around his snout was none-too-hidden.

"Well, duh," Gabe replied, and Alber nodded alongside him.

"Yeah, but we all want you to do it."

Mera clasped her hands together, rubbing them so rapidly so that she could have been kneading a pale, shapeless mass of dough into a loaf of bread. "Excellent. I'm in."

Automatically, everyone turned to Rainbow.

He backed up slowly into the trees, holding his hands up in a peace offering. "No. You. Don't." The words were slow, sure, careful. "Please don't make me. Not just me – you guys neither. It won't help, mark my words."

"Huh?" Alber expressed all his confused-ness in that single slang word which Microsoft Word accepts without annoying red lines for some reason. (It also accepts Microsoft. Talk about bigheadedness. XD). "What do you mean?"

"He thinks that'll break them up, Alber." Midnight smiled at his young friend before turning back to Rainbow. "No, don't worry. The least they'll do is go chasing us all over the island, but I think it's worth it."

"Um…" Rainbow paused once more, but now the others turned gangster on him once more and began shaking their heads in mock anger.

"Who wants to listen to Rainbow, the Mythical Yoshi of Legend?" Mera called joyously into the small crows, and raucous catcalls met her voice. "I know I don't!"

Rainbow groaned and hid his head in his hands. When Mera was up to something, there was no stopping her.


	17. Reunite!

**A/N: Love will Save the Day is a Song by Usher. I'm not entirely sure it's called that, but I know that's the refrain.  
**

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The first thing Lauranna felt that day when she began to talk with her best friend, Nicky, as usual, was an odd scratching sensation on her back. Her temper quickly rousing from its listless sleep, the periwinkle Yoshi whirled around. The only sound that met her -- uh, whatever Yoshis have in place of ears -- was a faint giggling and the rustling of leaves. Angrily grinding her teeth one against the other, Lauranna turned back to Nicky.

"Well, Nick, it's a beautiful day today… What should we do?" she asked, rubbing her back as if she could ward the pain away.

He shrugged. "I was thinking maybe we could go to the beach – you know, we could swim and play in the sand and stuff. Maybe we could go with some of the younger kids."

"Good idea, Nicky," agreed Lauranna. It was too soon, though, when she felt scratching on her backside again. The feeling was aggravating, but she mentally threw down the feelings that were quickly running through her mind and contented herself by stamping one booted foot into the grass. "Say, Nicky, do you see anyone behind me? I feel like someone's scraping against my back but I can't catch whoever it is."

"It's Alber… And Midnight, Gabe, Mera, and Rainbow." The expression on his face turned to one of annoyed-ness to one of shock. "Rainbow?"

"How in the world did Mer ever suck you into this?" Whipping around to face the motley crew, Lauranna kicked out viciously. Within an instant the Yoshis had jumped back several paces and Rainbow had now broken out in shivers.

"Hey, we were just trying to do something nice." A grunt was accompanied with this statement as Midnight pulled Rainbow away from the danger, gesturing for him to run away with Mera. "You know?"

Lauranna swerved to the side as a blue-booted foot came crashing down for her, but instead of landing on her spike-scaled head, it plopped right down on the grass beside her. The foot sent small cracks running through the ground; she had to jump backwards as not to trip from the mini-earthquake. On Nicky's other side, a red-booted foot had done the same thing, and Lauranna found herself frighteningly close to the pine-green Yoshi. "Uh oh," she muttered to herself, and not without reason; she saw a small red figure running off into the trees behind her.

In the corner of his eye, Nicky could see a small, flighty blue figure giggling wildly as it disappeared into the trees. He knew that the Yoshi was the owner of one of the booted feet that had brought them closer together. Nicky knew precisely which Yoshi he was.

And so did Lauranna.

She didn't return to Nicky until she had fully chased Alber and Gabe from their respective tree hideouts all the way to the shoreline. The two young Yoshis ran wildly for their lives as their periwinkle (former) friend pursued them over the grassy terrain. "You!"

"Yes, us," muttered Alber to himself, skidding to a halt. When he had jumped back to his feet and faced the horizon, Lauranna was gone.

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"She's with Nicky," affirmed a weary Rainbow later that day as he rejoined his friends in the tribe settlement's eating hall. "I saw them talking."

"Quietly?" queried Midnight, and Rainbow nodded glumly.

"I'm not sure I want to do this anymore… I mean, what if some of the Yoshis we're trying to set up get angry at each other instead of us?" Rainbow put voice to his fears, laying his head in crossed arms.

"Bud, you worry too much," came a cheerful voice from above, and the quintet looked up in surprise to find Yoshi standing there. The green rideable dinosaur looked pleased – which would explain his cheer – and none the least angry that they were playing matchmaker. "After all, with these guys on your side, you can't go wrong," Yoshi went on, tossing a pleased yet mischievous smile to Rainbow. "Especially with Mera."

"Hey! No fair!" cried Mera as she caught the sight of Yoshi's rolling eyes. "I always thought _you_ were the crazy one."

"Yeah, you're just crazier." Midnight passed his own fleeting smile over to Gabe, who giggled.

"Anyway," he interrupted loudly – though happily, as it always was with Gabe – "Who should we set up next?"

Instantly, the rumble of chatter ceased and everyone exchanged glances with each other. Indeed, no one knew exactly who – with Rainbow in their mist, they couldn't play matchmaker with him and Canberra.

_Or can we_? Midnight rubbed his chin at the thought of setting Berra and Rain up together. Obviously, they would have to find some way for Rain to evacuate the room, but… _The possibilities are endless_, Midnight thought as he scrutinised the delicate leaf pattern carved into the table's palm tree wood. Absently, he traced one hand around the shape of a particularly pretty rose blossom impressed right in between a dancing, fluttering mass of leaves. He could see a story reflected right through the palm wood – it was the height of spring, and the roses were blooming. In light of this, the leaves had taken to honouring the rose's blossoming by flittering excitedly around it.

_Dance of the leaves_, Midnight though to himself, a smile slowly spreading across his face as he cast his eyes over other engravings nearby. _Kinda like us – we're watching, like the leaves, as the roses, like the couples, are set up by us. We must honour these pairings lest danger ever come crashing down upon us._

The last thing was a most uncharacteristic thing to say, and Midnight wrinkled his snout at the thought. _Where in the Mushroom Kingdom did that come from? It's just _so_ not like me._

Nonetheless, Midnight looked up, a faint grin curling his features, at the forms of his fellow Yoshis, hard at work planning who they should pair with who. This strange smile flickering around the corners of his mouth, Midnight set to work with his plan. Well, in his mind, that is.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

"You sure you don't want us to help you and Violet?"

The expression on Mera's face was literally pleading, but Yoshi slowly shook his head. "Birdo, remember?" His face flushed as he launched on with his bit. "I didn't remember her before a few days ago… Anyway, I'm too young."

These were the sounds that met Rainbow's – uh, hearing organisms – as he stealthily left the tribe settlement. The young Yoshi was confused about what he should do – earlier, he had seen Midnight plotting. At least, that was what it had looked like to Rainbow. Any one time the dark blue Yoshi could be seen thinking could be a bad one – for him, anyway.

Rainbow also didn't know if playing matchmaker with the others was the right thing to do, but that only added to his dilemma. His real motivator wasn't even the crafty Midnight, but rather Tara and Beran.

His parents.

They were his parents now, at least. And Rainbow planned to see them, planned to find out what he'd been missing these last long years. He could do it, he knew he could. Or so he would have been able to, had something tall and shadowed been blocking his pathway.

"Going somewhere?" a voice inquired, and the Mythical Yoshi of Legend found himself backing up slowly.

"Uh… (Granted his shy and is-this-the-right-thing-to-do? nature, Rainbow wouldn't eve lie to save his hide.) "I…"

But then a beam of faint afternoon sunlight flung itself right into the figure's face, and the young Yoshi saw someone he recognised.

"Beran!" cried Rainbow, scampering forward. The middle-aged Yoshi smiled at him, rubbing one of his ridged scales as his adopted son came forward.

"You can call me Dad now," he began, but Rainbow shook his head:

"Nah, I prefer it this way."

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"Well, Joro, I feel oddly justified in-a saying that I'm a-gonna miss this place."

The tall green Yoshi nodded at Mario's positive statement as the red-clad plumber fondly rubbed the _Mushroom Express._ His gloved hand traced the loops and curves of the fifteen letters as he sighed contentedly.

"Yeah, but when you think about it, it's a good thing Mera and Midnight know just how to set up couples like that. Piece o' cake, isn't it, Mario?"

The plumber nodded at his friend. "Yeah – who would've a-known that the old meet-me-at-sunrise-under-the-palm-tree manoeuvre would actually have a-worked. At least-a, I think it did."

Giggling gently at his brother's expression of utmost shock, Luigi giggled and pressed one finger on his ribs - hard. Mario groaned loudly and lunged, but he only ducked cleverly again. The grin on his face was apparent. "Duh duh duh duh…" (Random Bach theme!) "Of course it did."

"Yeah, we saw Canberra and Rainbow before. They looked peacefully happy," nodded Olivia, and her friends chattered along with her.

"And," added Elsa with a quick look tossed behind her shoulder, "he's coming right now."

"I heard that," came a voice from behind them; the thick knot of Yoshis turned to see Rainbow walking toward them. The Mythical Yoshi of Legend – indeed – wasn't alone; he was with Canberra. The two of them had been talking together before Rainbow had hailed the others. "We have a right, you know."

It didn't take long for Midnight to notice that Rainbow's normally flashing, colourful scales had changed to one single colour – a dark, fresh midnight blue. _Rain's version of a flush,_ he thought with a devious grin.

"Anyway," Canberra announced loudly - distracting Midnight from his devilish thoughts, "I notice nobody has dared to set up you and Mer yet."

This sentence was accompanied by a knowing smirk and a clever flashing of scales. Midnight flushed deeply and lurched for her, to be reined back in by Joro. "OK, buddy." The older Yoshi scolded him sternly. "That's enough of that." With that, he lifted him by his red ridged scales and deposited him safely out of the line of danger. Midnight squirmed, then ducked his head ashamedly as his tale drooped to the floor. "Erp…"

"I have to say, I'm going to miss you Yoshis when I'm gone." Peach wiped her eye with a blue lace handkerchief as she shook Lila's hand. "Living with you for a month can do that to a person, I suppose."

"I as well, Princess Peach." Lila inclined her head in the traditional Yoshi fashion; Peach, not knowing how to respond, bowed her head so that it glowed, a mass of molten butter-yellow curls, in the sunlight.

"Well, so long, Yoshis." His wingtips flickering to keep him afloat, Porgal shook Tara's hand. It was a strange enough sight: the thickly-knuckled, blue-veined orange-amber hand moving up and down with the small, swift green one. "I have to say this: our ways may part, but with hope our paths shall cross once more."

"Where did you get that quote?" asked Parakarry. The Paratroopa was carefully arranging some sheets of Yoshi leaf paper, a bunch of Tinkleberries, a ridged orange scale that had formerly belonged to Canberra, a blue jewel peacock feather and other assorted natural and Yoshi-made objects from the island in his rucksack. The items were just lightly sprinkled over with a thick coating of letters that were Parakarry's idea to deliver. "It doesn't really sound like something you would say."

"I made it up, though, old boy." His great-uncle cheerfully gave him a hearty slap on the shoulder. "I've got more smarts in me than you think."

"Right." Parakarry replied in a sarcastic deadpan before snapping himself out of hit and shaking Beran's hand. "It was an incredibly thoughtful and kind on you and your lovely wife's part to adopt the Mythical Yoshi of Legend." He adjusted his goggles slightly and released the middle-aged Yoshi's hand, floating higher all the while. "What I mean is, it was nice of you two to take Rainbow in."

"T'was nothing," Beran replied with simple a shrug and a smile.

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"Yoshi?"

The green dinosaur turned at the sound of the voice, but it was just Luigi. Mario's little brother looked at him curiously, a question in his blue eyes.

"Are you-a all right?" he asked, posing one hand on his red saddle as they boarded the _Mushroom Express_. "You're a-coming with us?"

Yoshi could have laughed out loud. "Of course," he grinned at Luigi, "Why wouldn't I be?" _So that was all, _he thought with a small chortle as he waited for his friend to answer. _Still, though… I wonder why he asked me that._

"It's because I-a thought… I-a thought you would-a want to stay here with Violet," stuttered Luigi, a flush darkening his cheeks at the thought – anything could remind him of Daisy, including talking with his brother's steed about the Yoshi girl he liked.

"No, I can't." Yoshi shook his head vigorously as the two of them entered the plane's wide doorway and seated themselves among the other passengers – aside from their friends, the place was filled with travelling Piantas, exploring Nokis, voyaging Goombas, journeying Koopas and adventuring Boos (plus a whole lot of other races I shall leave for your imaginations to fill). "Back home… Back home, there's Birdo, you know? I just remembered at the eleventh hour."

Luigi whistled from under his mustache, his face still hotly flushed. "So you-a decided to go with us to-a hide the embarrassment."

Yoshi's face went red.

"N-Not exactly," he stuttered in answer, "but I don't want her to feel neglected."

And what is the fate of everyone's favourite Yoshi, caught between two admirable girls? (Actually, it was a plot hole. My bad. XD) Will he be like Archie, forever doomed to handle with one at a time while the other looks on and kicks sand in his face? Or will we have a happy ending?


	18. The End of it All

**Much thanks to RIVolleyball214, Evy Sevin, Chibi tanuki** **and Blizzardfur, the only people who did something with this fanfic... (sigh) Oh well, I'll keep this on my profile either way. When I've written my 200+ fanfics --**

**Pikasqueaks: You're gonna write over 200 fanfics?**

**Thecrazyfanficcer: (hits him) Begone, yellow one!**

**Pikasqueaks: Owowow...**

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The _Mushroom Express_ had lifted up into the soft island sky and a thick gathering of Yoshis were waving it off; several had tears sparkling in the depths of their eyes. Lila had one arm around Thildon's shoulder; the others were too young to do much -- including the newly paired Midnight and Mera – were just standing in a smaller knot, the tips of their tails flickering one against the other as the behemoth mass of plane heaved itself into the skies and began its slow glide across the horizon.

"Goodbye!" called Lila; beside her, Thildon fidgeted as his ruby-red hand joined the mass of them above her head. "Until our paths ever meet again! _That's _when you guys can show me the rest of the Mushroom Kingdom!" she added sneakily. (Sadly, Mario and co. had promised to show Lila their home kingdom when they would return in three weeks as opposed to right then.)

"We'll be waiting!" -Thildon.

"Yeah, and don't forget to tell us about your adventures!" -Mera.

"Bring on the food, too!" –Midnight.

"We're going to miss you guys so much! Thanks, Yoshi, for bringing me to the light!" –Rainbow.

"What you get is what you get – can't wait for our paths to cross once more!" –Elsa.

"Yeah! Until we meet again!" –Roberta.

"Don't forget, OK?" –Alber.

"Why would they forget for, Alby? They like us so much. Oh, and we'll miss you guys!" –Gabe.

"You guys will remain in our hearts forever!" –Canberra – please, don't ask me why she said that. :D

"I'm going to miss you guy, too! Especially Yoshi." –Violet.

"You did so much for us, like setting Nicky and Lauranna up together!" –Cloudfluff.

"Hey, no fair! Yeah, wonder what will happen the next time we meet each other?" –Lauranna.

"Until then, so long and farewell. Quit poking me, Laur!" –Nicky.

"Thank you for giving us the gift of a son!" –Tara.

"We'll never forget what you guys did for us all. Thanks a lot. Until we meet again, buds!" –Beran.

"I look forward to that day with much anxiety and eagerness. See ya until then!" -Joro.

"We're really a-grateful toward you guys, too! You let us stay with-a you… Until our paths-a meet again." –Luigi.

"Yeah, bye for-a now, everyone! We'll a-be back!" –Mario.

"That's no reason to forget us, though! See you Yoshis in the long life ahead of us." –Daisy.

"'Til our paths cross once more. Bye, everyone!" –Peach.

"I can't wait to come back here again!" –Parakarry.

"With me, of course! Don't you just love great-uncles, Yoshis? Until then, g'bye, and have a happy life!" –Porgal.

"You were so kind to us all! Violet, I won't forget you!" –Yoshi.

"And don't forget, the adventures are never over!" –Mario.

You said it, Mario. You said it. The adventures are never over.

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"There you have a tale of true love, craziness, adventure, humour, even slight insanity…" Old Geeze ticked the qualities off one by one on his pointed yellow fingers. "What else could you folks want?"

"More craziness!"

The call was – without doubt – his grandson's. Rolling his eyes, Old Geeze turned to Pikachu, who had stood up in the midst of the crowd. The kneeling Pokémon milled around him, occasionally catcalling for their roguish friend. Pikachu himself was up and standing, arms crossed as he coolly surveyed the ancient storyteller.

Old Geeze cocked his head and raised an eyebrow (Of course, Pikachus don't have eyebrows. Whatever). "Oh, really, grandson dearest? Oh, really?"

The answer was quick and cool, but also excited.

"Yuppie!"

"Nah, I think that's enough crazy adventures for one night," retorted Old Geeze, allowing himself to faint as his body fell across the stool.

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**Pikasqueaks: There you have it, folks! Speaking of which, I love myself as a normal Pokémon instead of a muse...**

**Thecrazyfanficcer: (grins and does the peace sign) See y'all at least eight more times in this category!**

**Pikasqueaks: And to all a good (insert present time of day here)!**

**Thecrazyfanficcer: Bye! And 'till our paths cross once more! (pauses) And remember, the ultimately great and excellently awesome Mario belongs to Shigeru Miyamoto and not me!**


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